


Severed Crossed Fingers

by arabybizarre



Category: Orphan Black (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Rock Band, F/F, Friendship, Indie Music, Multi, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-21
Updated: 2015-05-28
Packaged: 2018-02-18 03:35:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 23
Words: 111,459
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2333768
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arabybizarre/pseuds/arabybizarre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rock Band AU. Cosima is one of indie music's newest darlings. After a chance encounter with drummer Delphine Cormier before a show, she is asked to be the opening act on tour for an internationally acclaimed rock band. Ultimately, she ends up getting a lot more than she bargained for. Cophine-centric, but will feature many familiar characters.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. One

It is a true testament to the potency of her nerves that she is currently emptying the contents of her stomach into a public wastebasket, as opposed to the toilet. She’d tried, for what it’s worth—having known that this embarrassing display was coming. She’d paced the cracked bathroom tiles for nearly forty minutes, up until the point when her bandmates came pounding on the door, hooting and hollering—already indecently inebriated. Attempting to salvage her dignity, she’d taken one last deep breath, puffed out her chest, and practically kicked the door open on both their faces, eliciting a fit of giggles.

Sarah and Felix – her touring drummer and bassist, respectively – had ribbed her about her nerves for a couple minutes before running off to check on their equipment. The preceding act’s set would be over in twenty minutes, and there wouldn’t be much time for them to switch out their gear and hit the stage. Lucky for the two of them, there wasn’t, like, _tons_ of pressure to perform perfectly. Not as Cosima imagined there was for herself.

Of course, her imaginings were pretty accurate. After the last EP had been endorsed by both _SPIN_ and _Pitchfork_ , a lot of buzz had been generated around the LP. It had been overwhelming, to a degree. Everything she’d produced had been done autonomously. She’d recorded everything inside of a storage unit, and cut the album on her MacBook. It wasn’t ideal, but she was resourceful. More importantly, she was in control.

Being interviewed by blogs and magazines was a nerve-wracking experience, but most were conducted over the phone or via skype. That was easier than dealing with people face-to-face. Things didn’t really start to feel especially nauseating until the small clubs she’d booked started selling out, and she’d had to move on to bigger venues.

She’d thought she’d gotten in some good practice these last couple of months, managing bigger crowds. It wasn’t until she stepped out on the stage that first morning of the festival, before the music began, when all the equipment was blanketed in tarpaulins and the festival-goers were still passed out in their tents, exhausted from a night of heavy drinking and wild trips, that she realized the scope of what she’d be dealing with.

There’s a literal _sea_ of people outside right now, chanting, screaming, singing along to the music, and in fifteen minutes, she’ll be standing before them, performing. If every major music magazine in the country weren’t standing out there, too, in addition to about five of her personal all-time favorite bands, it might not be so bad. As it is, she feels like maybe she shouldn’t have left that damn storage unit.

That thought alone is enough to make her retch again.

Once she feels confident there’s nothing left to expel, she stands up shakily, and wipes her mouth on her sleeve. Still, there’s a sheen of sweat on her brow. Removing her glasses, she wipes that same sleeve over her forehead, muttering under her breath.

“You’re a mess Niehaus.” She takes a deep breath, and considers talking herself down. “But, you’re going to do fine. Probably. If you manage not to royally—” Suddenly, she’s hunched over the trashcan once again, heaving through another wave of nausea.

“Oh my god,” she groans—to herself, she thinks. But before she even has a chance to wipe the vomit from her lower lip, there is a gentle hand on her shoulder.

“Hey.” She jumps at the contact, turning around with wide eyes. The tall blonde woman who stares back at her wears an expression that is equal parts amusement and pity. Perhaps a bit of familiarity, too, for this particular brand of nervousness. “Uhm, h—” Her throat burns, raw and raspy from the bile, and she finds she has a hard time speaking. “Hi. Sorry about the, uh,” she glances back at the trashcan, nose wrinkling in distaste. How utterly embarrassing. She doesn’t suppose this is the behavior of an _indie darling_.

The woman, to her credit, seems unfazed by the smell and the sight. She only chuckles at the mess, lightly, and offers Cosima a napkin.

“Don’t worry about it. Here, I grabbed this from the snack table.” Almost instantly, she picks up on the French lilt in the woman’s voice. As far as she knows, the only foreign bands that were booked were a couple of Brit-rockers and a Swedish electro band. _Maybe she’s press? Oh, God. What if she is? How would_ this _look?_

Really, she’d thought acclaimed musicianship would involve far less mortification. It’s fast becoming obvious how wrong she was.

Still, she sports a brave face – a beaming, gracious smile – when she accepts the napkin. She is grateful. Her own bandmates, her supposed best friends, have thus far only served to make her feel like a hysterical dork.

“Thanks.” The woman nods, hums, but says nothing more. She only watches Cosima for a moment, smiling softly, as she wipes her mouth. It is unnerving, to be honest. She can feel herself being appraised. “I’m not usually this, uh…” She doesn’t mean to be crass, but this woman is French, and perhaps with the press, and still staring as if she is evaluating her, and, _damn_ , actually quite attractive; and so she still manages to make a fake retching sound and explain, “you know, _Exorcist_ -like before shows. But, the crowd…” The heat instantly rushes to her face.

Nevertheless, the woman smirks, an inquisitive gleam in her eye. “You haven’t played a festival this big before?”

“No, no.” Cosima swallows thickly. She had hoped her inexperience would not be so obvious. The woman doesn’t seem to be teasing her though. She just seems curious. “Actually, I’ve never played a festival before. Period.”

“No?”

“No. Two weeks ago I played for a crowd of about 2,000. That’s been my biggest so far.” The woman smiles at that. Then, as if a sudden thought has occurred to her, she narrows her eyes.

“Oh. I think I know who you are.”

“Do you?” That thought makes Cosima particularly nervous.

“Yes… I’m afraid I only know you by your stage name though. Nautilus?”

“Yeah! Yeah, that’s me.” She feels momentarily giddy that this kind (if not somewhat intense) French woman knows who she is; but then the butterflies set in once again. She tries to shake them off, thrusting her hand forward. “I’m Cosima.”

“Cosima,” the woman repeats, the syllables rolling off of her tongue in a lovely triptych. She can only nod, smiling. She wouldn’t mind hearing this woman say her name again. “A friend sent me your EP recently. Your music—it’s very good.”

“Thank you.” Sometimes the compliments are a bit numbing. She’s been very good at music since she was very young – she’s used to being told as much. This one is soothing, however. She’s not feeling quite so nauseated now.

“Of course. But, you must be hearing that a lot lately. Everyone seems to be talking about you.”

“No,” Cosima laughs, somewhat awkwardly, and clears her throat. “Not everybody. You get one feature from _Pitchfork_ and suddenly you’re all over the blogosphere. But, it’s mostly just college kids, I think.” The woman snorts slightly.

“Yes, that would be everybody.” Cosima smiles. Looking up at the woman, she allows herself to match her scrutinizing gaze, lips pursing in concentration. She gets the feeling that this woman is not a member of the press. In fact, she feels, quite distinctly, that she knows her from somewhere. _Maybe she’s in a band?_ She means to ask her, but the second she opens her mouth, she can hear her name being called.

“Cos! Oi, Cosima!” She turns around to see Sarah jogging up to meet her, a tangle of cables slung over her shoulders, and a pair of drumsticks sticking out of each pocket. “You all finished chumming yet?”

Self-consciously, Cosima wipes her mouth with the napkin once more. “Yeah. What’s the time?”

Sarah laughs. “You’ve got maybe five minutes to get your pedal board in order.” Cosima’s stomach drops.

“Five minutes?”

“Yeah. Five.” She fixes Cosima with an expression that screams _duh_ before she notices the woman that stands just behind her. Her head cocks slightly to the left, eyes widening before she shakes her head and looks back at her bandmate. “C’mon, Amadeus. We’ve gotta get moving.” Cosima hates that nickname—Sarah’s way of branding her a prodigy. Maybe she should take it as a compliment, but it feels more like a tease.

“Yeah, yeah, okay,” She replies hastily, a bit annoyed, and throws the napkin in the trash. Sarah exits for the stage, rolling her eyes. Rubbing the back of her neck, Cosima turns to the woman, motioning towards the stage. “I gotta—”

“Of course,” the woman says. “Go. I’m going to go out front and watch.”

“Oh,” Cosima replies, somewhat dumbly. The nerves return full force. Having no time for them, she shakes her head and takes a couple steps backwards. “Cool. I’ll make sure to… really kill it. Seriously. I’ll knock your socks off.”

The woman smiles. “I don’t doubt it.”

“Yeah, thanks.” Suddenly, Cosima stops. “Hey, wait—”

“My name?”

“Yeah,” Cosima grins, laughing a little.

“It’s Delphine.”

“Cool.” She continues backwards. “Thanks for the napkin, Delphine.”

* * *

 

“C’mon—another!”

“Yeah, suck it up, Cos! This is a celebration,” Sarah insists, while Felix pours another round of bourbon shots.

“I don’t know,” Cosima groans, brow furrowing. When they’d first attempted to escape back to their van after the set, they’d been intercepted by three different journalists, each waving their VIP lanyards as if it gave them the right to back the talent into a corner and thrust a recorder into their face.

Their performance had been exceptional. Cocky as they were, Felix and Sarah had roared onto the stage, eager and confident. They knew the songs as well as if they’d written them themselves, and knew Cosima even better – they’d backed her flawlessly.

Nervous and shaky, Cosima hadn’t been quite so self-assured. As much as she enjoyed talking to people in more intimate settings, addressing an entire audience always threw her off. Under the blinding lights, with a mass of thousands thriving in front of her, she’d stumbled over her words. Her hands had stumbled, too, the first couple of songs, fingers spasming over the frets in a few flubs that made her burn frustratedly about her entire face. But with Sarah and Felix hollering, grinning behind her, and the crowd responding so enthusiastically, she’d easily found her groove. Once she settled in, it had been a cakewalk.

It always astounded her to see people – fans, she supposed – singing along to her music. When they’d finally hit their stride, and she’d felt confident enough to gaze out at the eager faces in the audience, she’d seen them _shouting_ along, grinning like fools. It didn’t matter that the majority of them were probably stoned, or drunk. She could hear them, hear her words in their mouths. She’d felt such a thrill in that moment, from her head to her toes, it was almost like she’d been shot up with adrenaline.

Then, she’d glanced down at the VIP pit, smirking, ecstatic, and had seen that same blonde watching her, just as she had promised. Gone from her face was the quiet, cool appraisal. Instead, Delphine was bouncing on her heels, hands raised, singing along. When she noticed Cosima watching her, the brunette crooned into her microphone and winked.

“Just drink,” Felix commands, shoving the shot glass into her hand. His left knee rubs against hers while the other rubs Sarah’s. Sitting cross-legged in their little circle, surrounded by empty instrument cases and amps, there isn’t much room to move. Still, when there’s a glass in each of their hands, they throw back their heads and drink, nevertheless.

“God,” Cosima hisses, feeling the burn of the liquor tingle in the back of her throat. “That’s it. I’m done.”

“You only did four!”

“Yeah, four. On top of that fat fucking blunt? I think I’m good.”

“Oh, you’ve done much worse,” Felix rebukes, swigging straight from the bottle before passing it to Sarah.

“I don’t even like bourbon.”

“I’ll make sure to pick up a bottle of Cabernet for you next time, Your Highness.”

“Shut up,” Cosima says, shoving Sarah’s shoulder. Her drummer merely grins around the neck of the bottle, swatting her face.

“Cut it—out.”

“Oh my god,” Felix moans, reaching between the two of them for the door handle. “You’re like children.” Crawling over their laps, he kicks open the door and falls out onto the grass.

The sun is really starting to set now, the pink-purple twilight melting into the starry California night. While the sun still hovers, a thin, luminescent sliver over the horizon, the moon dangles much larger overhead. Managing to slink out of Sarah’s oncoming headlock, Cosima digs her bare toes into the grass and looks up. In spite of her previous nerves, she knows it’s been a pretty excellent day. If they can make it to the nearest stage without being trampled, they could have a pretty excellent night, too.

“Who’s playing next?”

“At nine,” Sarah asks, leaping out of the van half onto Cosima’s back, bottle of bourbon in hand. Cosima stumbles, throwing her arm around Sarah’s shoulder for balance.

“Sure.”

“Like you don’t know,” Felix laughs, locking up the van. Together they stroll leisurely in the direction of the stage, Felix coming up behind his sister and swiping the bottle from her hand.

“Me?”

“Yes, you,” Felix smirks.

“I _don’t_ know,” Cosima replies, confused.

“Please,” Sarah laughs, “everyone’s been talking about this one.”

It’s a big festival. Some of the most currently acclaimed bands in the country are slated to play. The few headliners come to mind, but there’s one in particular Cosima suspects.

“In Vitro?”

“Bingo,” Felix replies. They’ve been one of the biggest rock bands in the world for about two years now. It’s common knowledge. Honestly, Cosima isn’t very familiar with them—has never listened to them much beyond the few songs she’s heard on the radio. They’re good, she thinks, but they’re not quite her bag. Still, they’ve got some sort of obviously marketable appeal. That, she knows.

“Yeah, Cos,” Sarah rushes forward and reclaims the bottle from Felix’s grasp, walking steadily backwards as she glances at Cosima with a teasing gleam. “You know, that pit is going to be a _swamp_. You should’ve picked us up a couple of VIP passes to that shit-show when you had the chance.”

“And when exactly did I have a chance?”

“Uhm, maybe when you were puking on their drummer before our set?”

At that, Cosima stops dead, eyes going wide. Felix merely turns around, eyebrows raised. “Oh, well, _that_ sounds delightful,” he quips.

“Holy watershed.”

“Wait, you didn’t _actually_ puke on her, did you? I was just ribbin’ ya with that part.”

Cosima groans, palming her forehead. It suddenly makes so much sense now, why she’d thought the woman looked familiar. Even if she’s not _overly_ familiar with the band, she’s certainly seen them in passing. A lot. On television, YouTube, the cover of _Rolling Stone_. They even had a few gaudy billboards up in San Fran a couple months back when they’d dropped their latest album. She’d thought it was tacky as hell; of course, she’d also remarked once or twice how much of a babe she thought the drummer was.

“Good god. The drummer. _The drummer_ , guys?”

“Yeah, Cos. The _French_ drummer.”

“Ugh,” she groans loudly, Felix and Sarah chuckling in front of her. “How did I not—like, I didn’t _realize_ who she was! And she was such a babe. She _is_ a babe.”

“And you puked on her.”

“I didn’t puke on her! Just in front of her.” Thinking back on how disheveled and gross the entire encounter actually was, she winces. “A lot. Jesus.” When she feels her mortification rush back in full force, she bounds forward and takes the bottle right from Sarah’s hand, not hesitating in taking a long pull. “Her band—they’re huge. She’s like a legitimate rock star. My god.”

“Oi, Cos. Chill the hell out, won’t ya?” Sarah throws her arm around Cosima’s shoulder once again, while Felix relieves her of the bottle.

“It wasn’t a big deal, Cos. She was nice and everything, wasn’t she?”

“Yeah, of course. Super nice. Totally not the point though. Like, I just can’t believe I was so oblivious. I mean, she was standing right in front of me, telling me how much she liked my music, and—” Cosima considers this for a moment, those previous compliments seeming much weightier now. “Hey, she likes my music. That’s pretty cool.”

“She said that, did she,” Sarah asks, a note of pride in her voice.

“Well, yeah. And she was—did you see her down in front of the stage? She was pretty into it. She was, like, staring at me and—I winked at her.”

“Whoa,” Felix and Sarah both jostle her, whistling. Her cheeks heat up, but she grins, too.

“How charismatic of you! See, had she _not_ caught you with your head in the trashcan just moments before the show, I’m sure she would have thought you the picture of confidence.”

“Oh, shut up, Fee. She dug it. That’s all that matters.”

“Yeah, well, how about you remember that next time you start feeling all pukey before a gig?” As they near the edge of the crowd that’s growing around the stage, Sarah scoffs. “Will you look at this shite?”

“Yeah, I don’t think so,” Felix replies, placing his hands on his bandmates’ shoulders and steering them in the opposite direction. “Your new biggest fan has got fabulous hair and all, Cos, but I’m not getting stepped on by this crowd to hear her band play radio fodder.”

“Well, I mean, we could probably edge around—” Cosima makes an attempt at convincing them, suddenly eager to get another glimpse of Delphine—Delphine _Cormier_ —in the flesh, but Felix and Sarah aren’t having it.

“Ahh, don’t get all starry-eyed, Amadeus. She likes your music—so what? You don’t even like hers.”

“That’s not exactly true—”

“It _is_ ,” Sarah corrects her.

“If you’re looking for groupies, darling, we shouldn’t have any trouble finding you some away from the drunken horde.”

“Okay, okay,” she relents, as her bandmates push her away from the audience. Even knowing the stage is empty, she still glances back at it over her shoulder one last time, muttering, “But what if I could have a hella famous groupie?”

* * *

 

It is truly astounding, Cosima thinks, how easily her life can slip and slide back into that old banality.

She had played at North America’s most renowned music festival, and she had owned it. Seriously. She hadn’t been a headlining act – not by a long, long shot – but she had done a surprisingly adept job of resembling one. The attending journalists had had a field day with her after her performance. The press had pretty much unanimously agreed that she’d been the breakout act.

She’d deserved a celebration, and with the encouragement of Sarah and Felix, she’d had one. The final day of the festival was a total blur to her, in fact. The two days following that it had taken for her to recuperate were proof of just how thoroughly she’d enjoyed herself.

Of course, things had settled down jarringly quick from that point. The festival had marked the end of their most extensive tour to date (which, by professional standards, was still rather limited). After, Cosima had planned an indeterminate amount of downtime. Not six months since she’d written and recorded that first short LP, and she was already hoping to begin writing the next. She liked to move fast, and the hype surrounding her festival performance left her hopeful the opportunities would be falling into her lap. Unfortunately, aside from several interview inquiries and a hell of a lot of internet exposure, things had been quiet.

A month later, and she’s back to sleeping on the couch in Felix’s loft, subsiding on generic Lucky Charms and cheap weed, arrested by a painfully rigid case of writer’s block. The stagnancy of it all depresses her. Most days, she can’t help but sleep until two or three in the afternoon.

She’s just about resigned herself to the lack of opportunity, to the disappointment of playing another dive, when she awakes to the sound of her cell phone ringing off the edge of the coffee table.

She’s disoriented, to say the least. Judging by the length of the light streaming in through the window, it’s not even noon yet. Her face is crusted with drool as she reaches blindly for the phone, her glasses nowhere to be found. When she grabs hold of it, she answers without thinking, rasping a barely intelligible greeting.

“Uhm—hello.”

“Good morning,” the man on the other line chuckles brightly. “Might I be speaking with Ms. Cosima Niehaus?”

“Uh, yeah, yeah.” Groping at the floor, Cosima snatches up her glasses and shoves them clumsily on her face. “That would be me.”

“Terrific. I hope I didn’t wake you.”

“No. Almost noon, right? No way.”

The man chuckles again. “Actually, it ought to be about nine o’clock your time.” _Well, I guess that was a dead giveaway_ , she thinks. “No matter. Ms. Niehaus, my name is Aldous Leekie. I’m the manager for In Vitro.”

At that, Cosima sits up. “What?”

“In Vitro. I’m sure you’ve heard of them. As a matter of fact, I know you have. Delphine spoke very highly of you after your meeting.”

“Oh… did she?”

“Certainly. She found you to be quite… humble. And she loved your performance that afternoon.”

“Well, that’s—” She’s running her hand through her dreads, suddenly feeling very far from exhaustion, and very unsure of how to respond. “—great. I unfortunately didn’t get to see hers. Only heard it from a distance.”

“Oh, that’s a shame.”

“Yeah, totes—I mean, definitely. Would’ve loved to see them.” The statement is partially disingenuous. She’s not sure she would’ve cared to hear In Vitro’s music live. That night, she was far more concerned with eyeing their drummer.

“Well, the reason that I am calling may very well remedy that missed opportunity.”

“Oh… what would that be?”

“I’m not sure if you’re aware, Ms.—”

“Cosima.” She corrects. Her heart is beginning to race slightly. She has no idea what this call may be about, but she feels certain that if the manager of a super famous rock band calls your cell phone on a Monday morning, you can expect good news.

“Cosima. I’m not sure if you’re aware, but In Vitro will be heading on tour early next month to promote their latest album.”

“Yeah… I may have heard about that.”

“Excellent, then promotion have been doing their job.” He chuckles again. “Now, the reason I’m calling _you_ is, the group is in need of an opening act on tour—” The words “opening act” set her heart to hammering in chest. “—and Delphine seems to have been so impressed by your performance that she recommended Nautilus for the job.” Leekie pauses for a moment, allowing Cosima room to respond. However, she is simultaneously too shocked and too thrilled to say anything. “Do you think that would be something that would interest you?”


	2. Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, it's almost Saturday, right? I honestly didn't feel like waiting any longer to post. I'm too stoked on the warm reception this story has received so far. You guys are terrific. Thanks for reading! I'm having a lot of fun with this one.

“Sarah… _Sarah_ ,” Cosima hisses under her breath, tugging on the sleeve of the woman’s leather jacket. “Keep your hands in your pockets, will you?”

Sarah grins back at her wryly, eyebrows raised in what Cosima has come to recognize as an indolent challenge. “What,” she asks, feigning ignorance as she traipses from the other girl’s grasp. “Afraid I’m gonna nick something?”

Glancing around the elegant hallway they’re currently being led down, lined on one side with spotless picture windows, framed records of various esteem donning the other, Cosima can only frown. She thinks highly of Sarah – Felix, too – but she doesn’t exactly trust either to keep their hands to themselves. If Felix weren’t so enamored with the coiffed, well-built assistant currently guiding them, she’s sure he’d already have his pockets stuffed. Sarah, on the other hand, undeterred, has a particularly dubious twinkle in her eyes.

Towing them along to her meeting with Leekie hadn’t exactly been the smartest idea, she’s realizing. Considering they’re only part of her touring band, it hadn’t even been necessary. They’d told her as much. However, they’d also told her they’d never pass up a chance to schmooze if it meant free food and a couple nights in a fancy hotel.

In truth, Cosima was perhaps just a bit too anxious about this entire situation to go it alone. She can be charming as hell when she wants to – sometimes without even trying – but there’s something about major labels and… big-wig entertainment types in general that turns her stomach. Sarah and Felix are here to keep her grounded, comfortable—as much as they’re here because, regardless of their place in Nautilus, they’re going to be spending the same month on tour as she. She figured it would be better for them to meet the band now, and get their impetuous first impressions out of the way.

“Yeah, I _am_ a little afraid,” she sighs, skipping forward to keep pace with Sarah.

“Oh, please, like I even could,” her drummer scoffs, reaching out a hand towards the nearest piece of décor: a framed platinum record. “This shit is bolted to the wall any—”

“ _Sarah_ —” The reprimand hasn’t even left her mouth by the time the record is falling to the floor, immediately catching the attention of their guide, Charles; Felix; and a nearby receptionist.

“Shite.” Felix laughs as Sarah stares down at the (blessedly) unbroken frame on the hallway floor. Charles is rushing forward in the same moment as Cosima, who nearly smacks him in the face in her attempt to retrieve the record.

“I’m sorry—so sorry,” she apologizes, too embarrassed to even muster the venomous glare she ought to be shooting Sarah.

“Yeah, sorry, mate,” Sarah says, sounding genuinely apologetic as she pats Charles unceremoniously on the back.

“It’s fine,” he assures them both. “Really, nothing broke.”

“Honestly, I thought all this shi—” Cosima’s eyes widen dangerously at the almost-curse. She’d warned them both about language. Language, and personal space, and proper business etiquette. They’re not exactly professionals, and in truth, none of them really care to be. Still, that doesn’t mean they ought to speak like kids. “— _stuff_ was nailed into the wall,” Sarah corrects.

“Well, no,” Charles laughs half-heartedly, looking around for a place to deposit the frame.

“Perhaps you ought to look into it, Charles,” Felix interjects brightly. “Might ward off _thieves_.”

“The thieves don’t make it past security,” Charles assures them, handing off the record to the nearby receptionist.

“You would _think_ —” Cosima cuffs them both on the shoulder before Charles has turned back around, effectively terminating whatever sarcastic remark Felix was attempting to make.

“Ouch—”

“Still— _so_ sorry about that. Seriously.” For a split second Cosima swears she can see the reprove in the man’s expression, the unsaid, _“Well, you_ should _be. Amateurs.”_ But just as quickly as she glimpses it, it’s gone, a placating smile in its place.

“No need to be, Ms. Niehaus. Accidents happen. Shall we move on?” He glances at his watch quickly before ushering them forward. “I’m sure Aldous is waiting.”

“Of course.” She walks ahead of her bandmates the rest of the way, opting instead to stand beside Charles, making small-talk. She can hear Sarah and Felix sniggering behind her, remitting some psychic plea to _“Chill the hell out, Cos.”_ The aggravation she feels towards them is somehow a comfort, something they’re more than aware of.

When they’ve finally reached their destination, Charles stands before the door, clipboard held tightly to his chest.

“You’ll have to be extra quiet.”

“Is this Mr. Leekie’s office,” Cosima asks. Charles shakes his head.

“Actually, Aldous thought it might behoove you to see the band in action first.” Out of the corner of her eye, Cosima can see Sarah, mockingly mouthing the word _“behoove”_. Felix, on the other hand, still seems quite caught up in the movement of Charles’ mouth. “You’ve probably never seen a studio like this.”

“Not exactly…” Cosima trails off as Charles raps crisply on the door, ignoring the thin tendrils of embarrassment twisting her stomach. Glancing back at Sarah and Felix, the two seem perfectly at ease, if not somewhat haughty. They’re practically sniggering. Cosima turns back towards the door, shaking off her negativity. She’s not been misplaced. She was asked here.

Leekie greets them at the door with a bright smile. Cosima had googled him before they’d left, just to familiarize herself. In person he’s taller, thinner – almost skeletal – and somehow, far more intimidating.

“Cosima Niehaus.” His eyes fix on her immediately, bypassing Charles and her bandmates completely. She feels pierced by his gaze. Nevertheless, his hand is firm, warm when it grasps hers, shaking gently.

“Yeah—yes. Mr. Leekie. It’s a pleasure.”

“Oh, no,” he chuckles. “I lose hair every time someone calls me _Mr. Leekie_. Just Aldous, please.”

“Aldous,” she forces a chuckle. “Well, thank you.”

“Of course. The pleasure is mine.” He gestures them inside with a sweep of his hand, greeting Sarah and Felix as they walk in behind her.

Cosima’s not sure what she’d been expecting when they’d stood outside the door. She knows what recording studios look like – at least in theory – but seeing the soundboard up close, with its dozens of sliders and sleek metal knobs; the monitors with their bright, blinking LEDs; and then, behind the glass, the nest of cables taped to the floor, instruments placed precisely, the expensive microphones. The tech alone is enough to make Cosima gape, but what really entrances her are the figures behind the glass.

She’d googled them, too – listened to both their albums on the flight over. She’d read interviews, watched live YouTube videos, studied the press shots. Listening to them now, muffled through the partition, she can almost forget how tedious she’d found their records—radio-rock for the masses. They just look good—look _great_ —plain and simple. Paul Dierden on lead guitar and vocals, pouting into his microphone. Beth Childs, his on-again off-again, looking like a hard-ass on bass. Art Bell, cool and collected on rhythm guitar. And, finally, banging out a meticulous, rollicking beat on drums, Delphine Cormier.

Cosima tries not to stare, but her eyes drift helplessly to the kit at the back of the room. The way Delphine’s wrists roll, knees bob; the way her blonde curls bounce happily about her shoulders. Cosima knows, she’s more than just talented – she’s gorgeous. And beside the too-cool detachment of her bandmates, she’s completely out of place.

Maybe this is why In Vitro have always turned her off: they never look like they enjoy playing music. It’s a gimmick, she knows. It worked for the Generation Xers, the art-rockers, and the disaffected indie kids. Everybody loves to care about not caring.

Cosima doesn’t play on cheap emotional ploys though. She loves music, genuinely, perhaps more than any person she has ever known. She couldn’t hide it on stage if she tried. And Delphine Cormier might be pretty adept at throwing on a blank face when the occasion calls for it; but here, in the safety of her own label, her unadulterated joy slips through.

“It’s not our finest studio,” Leekie says, shaking Cosima from her daze. “Our top-of-the-line studios are held in a modest facility outside of the city; but we keep a few small recording rooms here at our headquarters for when we assess potential clients. Or, in cases such as this, just for a practice session.”

“Oh… right,” Cosima remarks lamely, distracted by what is happening on the other side of the glass.

“Seriously? _Small_ recording room,” she whips her head around at the sound of Sarah’s voice, having forgotten that her bandmates were even present. Thankfully, Sarah has finally decided to heed her words. She and Felix mill about the room, impressed by the equipment, though neither are eager to show it. However, this time their hands remain politely by their sides.

“A bit bigger than you’re used to?”

Sarah glances dryly at Leekie. “Cos records in a closet.” The older man laughs.

“Storage unit, actually. And I rig it up pretty nicely.”

“Well, that’s the trick, isn’t it?” He walks nearer to Cosima, hands clasped in front of his chest, and smiles at her in such a way that she can feel she is being appraised, if only subtly. “Closet, storage unit—who cares? Your albums are a treat, Ms. Niehaus.”

“Uhm… just Cosima, thanks. I’m not looking to lose any hair either.”

Leekie laughs again. He’s an amiable man, or at least in the company of “clients”. No matter how often he smiles though, this is still a business meeting. Cosima can’t forget that.

“Cosima, then. Would you like to take a seat while the band finishes up?” In a way, she feels like she has to. She sits down on the couch stationed at the far wall, glancing at Sarah and Felix, imploring them to join her. With shrugs, they take a seat. “Would the three of you like anything to drink?”

“No, thank you,” Cosima shakes her head.

“A glass of Chivas Regal would be delightful,” Felix pipes up, half-sarcastically.

“I’m not sure we have that,” Leekie chuckles, quirking a brow. “But if you’re in the mood for scotch, I have something much better in my office.” Cosima could smack Felix. She looks between him and Sarah, who, to their credit, look rather surprised. “Charles, why don’t you bring us that bottle of Highland Park?”

“Certainly, Aldous.” Cosima has to resist throwing her hands over her face. “

Thank you, Charles.”

“Yes, _thank you, Charles_ ,” Felix waves with the tips of his fingers.

Just when Cosima feels the mortification might actually kill her, the muffled sounds of music playing through the glass taper off. Glancing over, she can see the band setting down their instruments. It’s only now that they even acknowledge they’ve had an audience. Paul, Art, and Beth smile politely, but don’t seem to recognize them. Delphine, on the other hand, lights up when she sees them. Only for a moment, of course, before her professional persona washes over her again.

Cosima stands when they file into the control room, Leekie stepping between the groups.

“Well,” he says, addressing the band on the other side of the room. Paul stands at the front, smiling with the same disarming brightness as his manager, looking more like a military man than the leader of a famous rock group. Beth stands behind him, wary, but also curious, next to Art who seems friendly, if not bored. At the very back is Delphine. Cosima tries not to glance directly at her, but in the few weak moments that she allows her eyes to fall on her, she can feel Delphine pretending not to stare, as well. “Ready to meet your opening act?”

“Sure. I mean, since they’re standing in front of us. Paul Dierden,” the guitarist introduces himself, extending his hand. Cosima steps forward to take it, smiling calmly.

“Cosima Niehaus,” she says, shaking his hand. “Or, Nautilus. And these are my bandmates: Sarah, my drummer. Felix—”

“Bass player extraordinaire,” Felix interjects, taking Paul’s hand firmly.

The introductions are typical. Everyone smiles, but Delphine is the only one who seems to do so with complete sincerity. When she takes Cosima’s hand, she even leans in and whispers, grinning, “I hope your stomach is faring better today,” causing Cosima to color instantly.

“Yeah, yeah. Meetings are easy,” she says with quiet confidence.

She expects Delphine to retort with a cheeky remark, but instead, she nods encouragingly and says, “They are.”

After all hands have been adequately shaken and Charles has returned with the scotch, Cosima sits back down on the couch, sandwiched between Felix and Sarah. Though she’d much prefer a glass of wine, she graciously accepts the snifter that Leekie hands her, taking a healthy sip.

“Good, isn’t it,” he asks them.

“Very.” Felix smacks his lips, and Cosima can see it is taking every ounce of his restraint not to down the rest in a single swallow.

“Sarah? Cosima?”

“S’all right,” Sarah shrugs.

“Mhm,” Cosima nods, trying to discretely clear the burn from her throat.

“Well, I don’t mean to brag, but we’re a… _well-established_ record label. We take care of our artists, and we want you to know that, by association, you will be well taken care of in the next month, as well.”

“Right,” Cosima begins, setting down her glass on the coffee table in front of her. She’s not sure why, but she glances in Delphine’s direction for a brief moment before addressing Leekie again. “I do have a few questions regarding…”

“How well you’ll be taken care of,” Leekie asks, smirking over the rim of his glass.

“Yes—I mean, it’s not that I’m expecting very much. This is a great opportunity, and I—well, Sarah, Felix, and I—we really appreciate it. But we’re used to a pretty… minimalist stage show. Our equipment may be wanting—”

“Say no more. If it’s all right by you, we’re going to pair you up with one our tech people. He’ll take care of audio and lights for you over the duration of the tour. In addition to that, all hotel accommodations will be taken care of, food and drink, fuel, etc. Typically, our openers only have to worry about their day-to-day transportation. Do you have a bus, or…?”

“A van. Old faithful.”

“Excellent.” Leekie stands, towering over them. “Cosima, Sarah, Felix—I understand you may view this as a wonderful opportunity for yourselves. But at DYAD Records, we truly pride ourselves on not only the talent we book, but the kind of shows we can make possible for the talent, and our audiences. You’re a part of that now—helping _us_ to present a quality concert. We are very appreciative of that, as well. So, thank _you_.”

Cosima clears her throat, standing. This isn’t just a great opportunity – it’s an amazing opportunity. Yet, for some reason, her stomach still twists with nerves.

“Hmm,” Leekie ponders, glancing back at In Vitro, “shall we toast? It seems an appropriate time, doesn’t it?”

“Certainly,” Paul agrees, leading the rest of the band over.

“You might need to top some of us off,” Beth adds, glancing from her own empty glass to Felix and Sarah’s.

“Might as well finish the bottle,” Leekie says. Once the remainder of the liquor has been poured, he raises his glass, the rest of the room following suit. “To a new journey,” he proposes, glancing at Cosima and her bandmates.

“Hear, hear,” she says, clinking glasses.

* * *

 

Cosima feels better once they have left the elegance of DYAD Records behind for the night. As much as she would have loved to have returned to their nice hotel, maybe take a hot shower, the three of them are instead dining with In Vitro. It had been Leekie’s suggestion – if they were going to be spending the next month together, touring, they ought to get to know each other a little bit. In an act of goodwill, he’d offered up the company credit card to them for the evening.

Of course, dinner with Sarah, Felix, and herself never exactly ended there. The band had taken them to a _nice_ restaurant, or, according to Sarah, a _pompous_ restaurant. The meal had been delicious, and Cosima had finally gotten the glass of wine she’d been wishing for earlier in the day, but by that point, she was far more interested in slipping away to smoke a joint.

In Vitro may have beeen a bit bland musically (at least in her opinion), but they were a pretty decent group of people to hang around with. Paul was a bit pretentious, but he was smart, and surprisingly thoughtful. Beth was more lewd than Cosima would have imagined, and once she and Art had a few drinks in them, their banter was rather entertaining. Delphine was… well, quiet, frankly. But she was quick to smile, and to laugh, and Cosima didn’t think she could tire of either.

At some point Felix and Sarah had suggested they all sneak off to a bar – _“The kind of place where it isn’t frowned upon to smash a bottle over someone’s head.”_ – and surprisingly, they’d all agreed. Rather, Beth had agreed for them, but Paul and Art weren’t averse.

Since they left the restaurant, Delphine has been quiet though. Maybe even a little frightened. Cosima hadn’t noticed at first. By the time they arrived, she was already half lit, and as was custom, Sarah and Felix had baited her into a round of shots. After slipping away to _finally_ smoke the joint she’d rolled at the hotel that morning, her observational skills had plunged further. Everyone else seemed to be in a similar shape at that point – Felix, Sarah, and Beth the worst off – except for Delphine.

Now, her bandmates clearly aren’t doing much to make her feel comfortable, which means that Cosima, noble as she is, feels obligated to take up the mantle. She tells herself it has nothing to do with the adorably wide eyes Delphine keeps casting around the room in discomfort.

“I owe you,” Cosima says, handing Delphine a shot of vodka. The drummer had tucked herself away in the corner, scrolling through her phone and brushing off unwarranted advances. For a moment, she seems startled by the brunette’s sudden appearance; but after realizing she isn’t some sleazy drunk, she accepts the drink with a smile.

“What for?”

“I don’t exactly want to draw attention to it, so I’m just going to say… the napkins,” Cosima replies, sitting on the stool next to her.

“Napkins,” Delphine nods. “Okay, fair enough. Thank you for the shot, I suppose,” she says, sniffing the glass. “It smells like rubbing alcohol.”

“I _did_ ask if they had a bottle of red wine collecting cobwebs somewhere. No dice. Vodka was the least reprehensible thing I could think of.”

“I see.” After a moment’s deliberation, Delphine downs her shot, setting it on the bar with a grimace. Once the taste passes, she looks over to Cosima and smiles. “None for you?”

“Yeah, no. I’ve probably had enough.”

“Probably?” She glances out onto the floor where Beth hangs sensuously over Paul, and Felix repeatedly attempts to grind on Art. Sarah is nowhere to be found, but if Cosima knows her (and she does), then she’s likely attached to some guy’s face at the moment. “Well, I can think of a few people who have _definitely_ had enough.”

Cosima laughs. “Who do you suppose is the bad influence in this situation?”

“Even though I’ve only just met them this afternoon, I’m inclined to say _your_ bandmates.” She pauses a moment, cringing when Beth’s hand drifts very obviously to Paul’s crotch. “Then again, Beth can be a bit… immodest at times, too.”

“Immodest? Good heavens, she’ll corrupt us all!” Delphine glances at her sharply, unable to contain her grin.

“You’re going to be trouble this month, aren’t you?”

“Me?”

“Yes, you. You’re… cheeky. I have a hard time believing you’re as innocent and nervous as you seem.”

“Yeah,” Cosima laughs again, glancing at Delphine sidelong. She smirks mischievously at the blonde, whose grin bubbles into a chuckle. Cosima flushes suddenly, wishing she’d decided to buy herself one more drink. “You caught me. I’m the trouble.”

“I knew it,” Delphine laughs, shaking her head. Cosima is ready with another sarcastic remark, but sobers suddenly when the other woman turns away to glance at their bandmates, her profile silhouetted in the cheap lighting. Her eyes trail down the curve of the drummer’s neck, landing on the slight divot where throat meets collarbone, and flushes again. This time, her stomach clenches.

“Hey.” Delphine turns back at the sound of her voice, one eyebrow raised. “Joking aside,” she clears her throat, “uh, Leekie—I mean, Aldous—mentioned to me that you were the one who recommended us, and… well, that’s really awesome. This is kind of a big deal for us—for me, you know? So, thank you. Really.”

Delphine seems to appraise her for a moment, eyes giving nothing away, much like the first time Cosima met her. But then she is smiling, shaking her head.

“You don’t have to thank me.” Her hand drifts over to the bar, toying with her empty shot glass. “I like your CD, Cosima. And I like the way you play. It’s very… honest.” She glances up at the brunette, and for a moment, Cosima thinks she can see something like disappointment flickering in her eyes. “I think it will be fun, watching you play every night.”

“Yeah,” Cosima says, grinning broadly at her. “Me, too.” She pauses for a moment before reaching over to snatch Delphine’s empty shot glass, raising it to the bartender to signal another. When she looks back at the blonde, her smile turns crooked. “And I promise you, I won’t be _too_ much trouble.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Still some expository scenes in this one. I do like to take my time. The next few chapters will see more development between Cosima and Delphine.


	3. Three

No matter how many times it had made her retch, Cosima misses that humid festival stage the second she walks into the arena proper. At least the festival had been open. Standing out there under the blistering stage lights, she could breathe in the air, congealed as it was with the scent of sweat and beer; she could feel a slight breeze shifting the dreads hanging down her back. Now, she is enclosed, crowded.

In the pre-show emptiness, she’s given an accurate measure of capacity. It’s lonesome in a sense, standing on this massive stage, surrounded by thousands of vacant seats, eyes climbing up the steep stairwells into the nosebleeds, where the shadows swallow up each section of seating. She’s never seen an arena from this vantage.

“Damn,” she whistles, her own echo punctuating the sentiment.

“A little different than you’re used to?” The deep, jovial voice startles her. Jumping, she turns quickly on her heel to find Cal, her label-appointed technician, strolling out onto the stage. “Sorry, didn’t mean to scare you,” he says, waving his free hand in a conciliatory gesture. Under one arm he’s balancing his MacBook and a clipboard. The other clutches the mass of cables slung over his neck and shoulders.

“Totally fine,” she assures him, waving her own hands animatedly. “Just got a little distracted—admiring all this open space.” He nods, smiling as he sets down a coil of wires at the back of the stage. “And to answer your question,” she mutters, turning out to face the bare audience once again, “yes, very different. Bigger.”

“Well,” he grunts, hefting another bundle of cables, “you might find a thing or two you really like about it. There’s more space to fill in here, for one. I tend to think it’s more sonically pleasing.”

“I guess you would know.”

“It is my job,” he chuckles, rubbing his beard. “Just as long as the crowd can hear me—even way up there,” she points to that shadowy portion of the arena, up near the top, “then we should be all right.” She thinks on that for a moment, grinning crookedly and telling him, “Unless I start screwing up. Then you can turn us down. Like, _way_ down.”

“You won’t screw up.” She blushes slightly. They’d only just met Cal after leaving their hotel this morning. They’d met In Vitro’s intimidating-as-hell road manager, Rachel Duncan in the same instance. For the life of her, Cosima couldn’t imagine the woman sleeping on a tour bus, let alone mingling with arena rockers, but her brusque attitude had brooked no questions. Cosima and her friends hadn’t liked her (she legitimately feared for any interactions between Duncan and Sarah, actually), but she’d been fond of Cal immediately. Unlike the road manager, he’d been open and warm, everything coming out of his mouth with a note of sincerity. Where his confidence in Cosima comes from now, she has no idea, but she won’t argue against it.

“One can hope, Cal.”

He waves her off, grinning. “I watched the festival footage of you guys. You’re going to do great.” Then, he looks around, glancing over his shoulder. “Wanna know a secret?”

“Sure,” she nods. He walks over to her, leaning down to match her stature, and meets her gaze.

“I liked your set better than In Vitro’s,” he whispers. Cosima grins. “Don’t tell though. Dierden would probably have me blacklisted.”

She laughs, patting Cal on the arm and unburdening him of one of the cable coils he carries. “No worries. Your secret’s safe with me.”

* * *

 

As strange as standing on the bare stage had been, looking out upon the countless rows of empty seating, presenting herself to a packed house is far eerier. She likens it to a sacrificial offering, engulfed by the hot white stage lights, her palms opened in supplication as she transitions from song to song. She doesn’t feel as nervous as she should; then again, the entire concert is so utterly surreal it’s difficult to hold any stock in her own emotions.

She’d puked again before they went on. Just once this time, but that was all it had taken for Sarah to make a crass comment in front of the other band. She, Sarah, and Felix had all been invited to hang out in their dressing room prior to the show – an invitation meant to put them at ease, though surrounding herself with people prior to a performance tended to have the opposite effect. They could probably sense her anxiety, though Sarah’s ribbing at least gave her a sense of embarrassment to dwell on instead.

 _“She ralphed in the parking lot while we were hauling in speaker cabinets,”_ Sarah had laughed, sharing a beer with Beth. She’d then turned to Delphine, nodding to her with the neck of her bottle. _“Consider yourself lucky you weren’t in the general vicinity, yeah?”_

Delphine had grinned sheepishly at Cosima then, perhaps with a hint of pity in her eyes, which she’d chosen to ignore. She’d smirked back, embracing her humiliation, and said, _“Just the once though. I must be evolving.”_ And before either Sarah or Delphine had a chance to reply, she turned to her drummer and told her to fuck off. Even Felix had come to her defense then, draping an arm around Cosima as he sneered at his sister.

Theirs was, at times, a challenging relationship; but as Cosima slings her guitar strap over her shoulder, Felix and Sarah shouting blissfully behind her, she knows she wouldn’t have the courage to do this without them.

“Lay on the moves, Amadeus,” Sarah yells over the din of the crowd. Chatter rises from the audience in a disorienting clamor. “Shut their damn mouths _for_ them.” Cosima glances over her shoulder and grins.

“Yeah,” Felix adds, “give them the ‘ol—” When she glances at him he’s lewdly flicking his tongue into the open air. She barks out a laugh, giddy from the excitement and anxiety, thrilled by the humidity wicking off the bodies in front of her in waves. She throws a thumbs-up into the air, and Cal begins dimming the lights, purple and maroon LEDs spilling onto the stage in a thin fog as their instruments roar to life.

Unlike the festival, where Cosima’s hands had shaken from the emptiness of her stomach, the smothering of her nerves, they now glide easily down the fret board, steady in her total disbelief. It’s not until her songs fill the space fully, louder than she has ever heard them before that it dawns on her how amazing this experience is. _This is incredible_ , she thinks.

She doesn’t miss a note. Three songs flow effortlessly into each before she stops to wipe the sweat from her brow, finally addressing the crowd.

“Okay, okay,” Cosima says, hands flitting before her, and smiles. “How is everybody?” The first response is tepid, and she’s suddenly aware of how loud the conversation drifting from the crowd is. “That’s good—great. Gotta have some fun, right?” The people down in the pit, at least, seem to offer their quiet attention. Her heart flutters a bit. She’s never had so many people at attention at one time. It’s completely unlike the festival, where she performed half a weekend deep to an audience who were almost too stoned to stand. Even though she can faintly smell pot-smoke mingling with the aroma of beer and fried food filling the stadium, she knows this crowd is more conscious.

“You’re probably pretty excited to see In Vitro—” The audience absolutely screams. She’s taken off guard, even feeling a few pangs of envy. “Wow. Guess I know how to get you to listen. Well, we’re excited to see them, too. But first, we’ve gotta warm you up a little bit. We’re Nautilus, by the way.” She’s relieved when there’s a steady rumble at the sound of their name, albeit much smaller. “Thanks. Holy shit.” She laughs into the microphone, shaking off her self-consciousness, and looks back at Felix and Sarah. “I guess some of you have heard of us. If you haven’t, we’ve got a few more songs for you. Maybe we can turn you on.”

The crowd buzzes while she readjusts her guitar, looking at Sarah to signal the next song. When she leans back into her microphone, the crowd is watching her, some of their faces curious. Strumming the first chords of their next song, she can’t help but feel a bit stymied. She hadn’t expected hordes of admirers, but in comparison to the size of the crowd, the response still isn’t quite as enthusiastic as she’d hoped.

She sighs. Tonight, she’ll volunteer to drive the van. In the silence of the early morning hours, the road enshrouded in darkness, she’ll lose herself to the disquiet of her mind. She’ll see the faces of the front row, the way they just barely give her a chance. She’ll hear the dull commotion of In Vitro’s fans trying to talk over the sound of her music. She hopes she’ll remember the ones who actually clap for her, who cheer and answer her questions, but she worries she won’t.

That’s for tonight though. Right now she croons, cutting her fingers on the fret board, and playing as if she has _every_ chance of winning them over.

* * *

 

It’s half past midnight, and Cosima, Sarah, and Felix are standing out by the van, chatting with a few college kids who managed to stick around after the show. They’d been blindsided while loading their trunks—hadn’t expected to be stopped by fans. It had happened outside the clubs a few times, concertgoers asking for pictures, a quick autograph, maybe even to share a smoke. That had felt more like talking with peers though. This is different.

Several yards away, In Vitro are surrounded by throngs of eager fans, filling out autographs while Rachel stands watch. Cosima tries not to glance their way, instead devoting her attention to the small crowd of five chatting with them. It’s exponentially quieter over here.

“We saw you play at the Rickshaw Stop in San Fran about a year ago,” the guy nearest to Cosima says. She can feel his eyes on her, sidelong, checking her out. She’s exhilarated from the show, but exhausted, too, and can’t force herself to care.

“Oh, yeah?”

“Yeah,” he grins, taking a drag off his cigarette. “We were able to get right up in front of the stage. It was pretty rad.”

“Thanks, dude. How about this time?”

“You killed it,” one of the other guys interjects. “Couldn’t you tell?”

“She knows,” Sarah answers for her confidently. “She’s a perfectionist though.” For a little while, they just chat. They talk about albums and the best places to eat on the road and the free liquor the band gets in the dressing room.

Cosima is feeling pretty at ease, listening to one of the other girls advising Sarah where to pick up a good burrito before they leave town, when the guy with the cigarette turns suddenly to Cosima and asks, “Why are you opening for this band?” His voice is slightly accusatory, and she actually takes offense, though she tries not to show it.

“Why did you come to see them?”

“I didn’t. My girlfriend—” he glances at the chick standing next to Felix, “she bought the tickets. I actually came to see you.”

“Oh.” She feels like an asshole all of a sudden. Turning to the guy, she says, with genuine warmth, “I really appreciate that.” After a moment’s consideration, she adds, “I felt like we were gonna get eaten alive out there.”

“Don’t mention it,” he tells her, placing a hand on her arm. It seems innocent enough, so she doesn’t edge away, though she glances at the guy’s girlfriend quickly. Still talking to Felix, the girl is oblivious. “This is a bit of a different crowd than I’d expect to find you mixing with,” he says.

“Yeah, well… you know how it goes…” He gives her a disbelieving look, one eyebrow rising slightly. “It’s all about exposure. I worked hard on these albums. I want to share them with as many people as possible; but there’s no way in hell we’d be able to afford a tour this big as a headlining act.”

He nods, frowning slightly, and takes another slow drag off his cigarette. Cosima tries to turn her attention back to the others, but she has a hard time doing so. Something in the way the guy had looked at her, as if disappointed, nags her. She means to say something more about it, but he beats her to it.

“You were better at the Rickshaw Stop. I think because it was smaller. You talked to the crowd, really drew us into it.” Taking one last short drag, he flicks the butt of his cigarette away from them. “You seemed more like yourself.”

She opens her mouth to reply, to defend herself even, but before she has the chance, she catches Rachel striding towards them primly, her heels clicking, even against the asphalt. Cosima straightens suddenly as she nears, elbowing Sarah.

“Wha—?” When Sarah catches Duncan’s approach she scowls subtly.

“Cosima. I assumed you would have been finished loading your vehicle by now.”

Sarah and Cosima open their mouths at the same time, each with vastly different responses, but it is Felix who answers her, his tone diplomatically cheerful. “Oh, sorry, Darling. We just got a bit distracted.”

“I see,” Rachel says coolly, glancing at the kids they’d been talking to. “I’m sorry, but we must be moving on. The other concertgoers have already dispersed.” Sure enough, Cosima looks over to see In Vitro’s fans being led away by a couple members of the venue’s security team. Rachel is looking at their own fans expectantly, a little short on patience.

“Well, hey,” Cosima jumps forward, holding a hand out for whoever wants to shake it. “It was really nice talking with you guys. And thanks so much for saying _hi_. We appreciate it tons.” Cigarette Guy’s friends all shake their hands in turn, grinning and congratulating them on the set. He’s the last to do so, patting Cosima’s hand and shooting her a look heavy with expectation.

“Don’t forget what you’re playing for,” he tells her before he walks off. Her brow furrows in partial annoyance and partial confusion; however, there’s a bit of shame, too. Felix and Sarah give her strange looks, but she shrugs them off, grabbing for one of the cases still sitting in the gravel.

“Be quick,” Rachel tells them, not sparing the fans a backwards glance. “We’re leaving in twenty minutes with or without you.” At that, she turns sharply, and walks away.

“Good god,” Felix says, watching her walk back to the bus with a hand on his hip. “Did she sit on the business end of a broomstick this morning?”

* * *

 

Cosima drives all night. Around four in the morning, Felix offers to take the wheel, but she simply tells him to go back to sleep. She’s fine. She’ll drive until her eyes begin to droop. In the meantime, the radio silence, accompanied by her friends’ soft snoring, will allow her room to think.

She goes back and forth for hours convincing herself that they performed badly the night before. That they were ill-fitting of the audience and the venue. That they— _she_ —is in over her head. Then, suddenly, she gets a burst of energy and thinks, _No, we_ played _great_. _The crowds don’t all know us yet, but they will. With In Vitro’s endorsement, they’ll welcome us._

But then she remembers what that pompous ass with the cigarette had told her, and what it had implied. She figures he’s probably just some young _Pitchfork_ -adoring indie-snob who’s afraid of the small-time acts “selling out,” but what he said still hits a nerve. Playing good or bad doesn’t really matter if you’re playing for the wrong reasons, after all.

She doesn’t exactly feel clear-headed by the morning. As a matter of fact, she’s even _more_ conflicted, and tired as hell to boot. When Rachel sends her a terse text message around nine, alerting her that the band wants to stop for breakfast at the next “passable” restaurant, she’s relieved. Ten minutes later, they’re pulling into the parking lot of some diner out in the desert. It doesn’t look like much, but there’s hardly any other cars in the lot, which bodes well for the band.

She’s quiet at breakfast. Most everybody in their massive consortium is seated at the two big booths at the back of the restaurant, chatting and laughing, creating a stir. The only two people missing are Rachel, who opted to remain on the crew bus, and Delphine. According to Paul, she had to make an important phone call, and would join them shortly.

Twenty minutes later, Delphine is still missing, however. Cosima has managed to guzzle two cups of coffee in that time, and needs to piss. She hasn’t gone to the bathroom since after her set last night, she realizes. She gets up to excuse herself, but Cal, who’s been engaged in a conversation with Sarah, stops her.

“Just a head up, the men’s room was kind of disgusting. Worked for me, since all I had to do was stand there, but you might want to proceed with caution.”

Cosima cringes. “ _Great_.”

“You can use the bathroom on our bus if you want,” Paul offers. “Maybe check on Cormier while you’re in there?”

She feels like she should decline. Pissing on the side of the road is a little worse than a dirty bathroom, she thinks, and she’s done that plenty of times; but her constant curiosity about Delphine wins out. “Sure,” she tells him. “Thanks.”

She’s courteous enough to knock on the door of the bus. There’s no answer, but it isn’t locked, so she walks in anyway, a bit cautiously. Cosima had seen the interior a couple mornings ago. Stepping inside still throws her off kilter though. Subconsciously, she can’t help but compare it to their shitty van, which is a total mistake. This is essentially a luxury apartment on wheels.

She doesn’t see Delphine immediately, and she doesn’t call out to her. Whatever she’d been preoccupied with, Cosima assumes she was grateful for the privacy. Feeling suddenly intrusive, she decides it might be better if she slinks in and out of the bathroom unnoticed. However, as she’s reaching for the bathroom door, a muffled sound catches her attention.

There’s a quiet snuffling coming from one of the bunks. For a moment, she thinks she ought to leave, allowing Delphine her privacy. That thought is quashed the moment she pictures the blonde’s eyes glistening, cheeks wet with tears, however. She can’t really stand to see anybody cry, but this seems somehow worse.

Clearing her throat, she calls gently. “Delphine?” The snuffling immediately ceases. With her own cheeks already reddening, she takes a step nearer to the bunks. “It’s Cosima. I—sorry, Paul said I could use your bathroom and…” She allows the apology to trail off, feeling out of place. She should leave, she thinks, but she won’t. “Are you all right?”

There’s quiet for a moment, then the slight sound of a blanket rustling, something closing. Delphine opens up the curtain on her bunk, the look of surprise on her face dulled. It’s obvious she’d just wiped the wetness from her cheeks. In the light, Cosima can see she missed a few spots. She pretends not to notice.

“Cosima—I’m fine. Sorry. You can use the bathroom if you’d like.”

“Okay,” Cosima replies tentatively.

“I’ll be heading in to the diner in just a couple of minutes.”

“Right… okay.” She turns, actually taking a couple steps towards the bathroom before she stops and addresses Delphine again, looking apologetic. “You were crying.” Delphine’s eyes flash with embarrassment and— _something_ —for a moment before she forces a small laugh, pressing her hand to her forehead.

“Caught me.”

“Well…” She takes a step forward. “There’s nothing wrong with that, you know. I mean, no judgment.” She pauses for a second, glancing at her feet. “But I just want to make sure you’re okay. And, you know, if you want to talk about it—I’m all ears.”

Delphine blushes, glancing up at Cosima and really studying her for a moment. She’s sizing her up, Cosima can see, like she had that first day they’d met. It’s different this time though. The brunette imagines she’s searching for something – a sign of trust, maybe.

After a moment, the blonde shakes her head, chuckling nervously as she tucks a lock of hair behind her ear. “I’m fine, really. It was… unimportant.” She looks up then, flashing Cosima a genuine smile. “Thank you though.”

“Of course. No problem. It’s just—Paul had said you were in here making an important call. I wanted to make sure no one had, like, died or… been maimed or anything.”

“No, not even close,” Delphine chuckles, a bit self-consciously. “It was just…” She looks away, then shakes her head again. “It was stupid.”

“So?” Cosima stands closer, toying with her own hands. “I get upset over stupid shit all the time. I mean—” She probably shouldn’t admit this, but in a snap decision, decides to regardless. “—just last night, some guy made a dumb comment to me after the show, and I just obsessed over it all night. Totally bummed myself out for, like, no reason.”

“Who said something to you,” Delphine asks, her eyes slightly narrowed. She seems almost protective. The corners of Cosima’s mouth twitch.

“I don’t know. He was a ‘fan’. Came up to us while you guys were signing autographs.”

“And what did he say,” Delphine asks—definitely protective. She catches herself though, waving a hand in embarrassment. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

“Nah, it’s…” Cosima toys with her hands again, shuffling from foot to foot. Delphine seems to catch on to the antsy motion, and scoots to the edge of her bunk, patting the space beside her. “Thanks,” Cosima says, sitting. Delphine smiles at her. “Like I said, it was dumb. He was just this… hipster-music-snob. I mean—the guy was wearing a seersucker jacket over a Leonard Cohen tee-shirt. To an arena rock concert.” She rolls her eyes, and Delphine chuckles.

“Sounds like an accurate assessment.”

“Right? Throw on some jeans and sneakers, man. And why the hell would you wear some other musician’s merch to a show? That’s just in poor taste.” She clicks her tongue, eliciting another chuckle. “He said he’d seen me before, back at a little club in San Fran about a year ago. So, before the hype started.” She considers her next words, sighing slightly. “I wasn’t as good last night. He said I didn’t play like myself, or some shit like that. Then,” she takes a moment to spin the rings on her fingers—a habit of concentration, or nerves—and squints her eyes into the ether of the bus.

“The last thing he said, it was vague. Purposefully so, I think. He probably thought he was being profound. He got all disappointed and serious and told me ‘not to forget what I’m playing for’.” She looks at Delphine then, with a mildly self-deprecating smile, and says, “In other words: _don’t sell out_.”

Delphine considers her for a moment, eyeing her with the same frustrating neutrality she always seems to. There’s a flicker in the blonde’s eyes that belies her disposition altogether, but she gives nothing else away.

But then her hand is on Cosima’s arm, squeezing gently, and she is telling her, “I never got to see you in one of those San Francisco clubs, but I have a hard time believing you played a worse show last night. You were excellent. I think you always are. That’s why I wanted you to join us.”

Cosima smiles tightly, swallowing a sudden lump in her throat. _Don’t cry, stupid_ , she tells herself. She know it’s just a combination of the lack of sleep, the stress, and the sudden jolt of caffeine from the coffee she’d foolishly wolfed, but she really has to fight to keep her emotions in check.

“Thank you,” she eventually manages, her voice smaller than she would have hoped.

“I would tell you not let them bother you—the critics; but the truth is, they’re going to. If you’re the kind of person who _really_ cares, they will get to you.” Delphine looks away for a moment, glancing back at the laptop on her bed. Her hand returns to her lap, and Cosima misses the warmth. When the blonde turns back, she’s blushing. “I wasn’t on the phone when you came in, you know.”

“Oh… no?”

Delphine shakes her head. “I called my mother when everyone else left the bus, but that only took five minutes. After that—” She hesitates suddenly, looking away from Cosima when she decides to continue. “I was reading _The New Yorker_.” Cosima looks at her questioningly. “The album is still new, and our biggest tour just kicked off, so, naturally, they decided to honor us with a scathing article…” She trails off, but Cosima gets the gist. It’s ironic, she thinks, that they’d been upset over what was, essentially, the same thing: criticism.

Still, she hadn’t expected Delphine to be rattled by that sort of thing. Her, maybe—the amateur. But not a star like Delphine.

“They said that we are ‘exactly what is wrong with mainstream rock music today’.”

“Ouch.” Cosima actually winces a bit. “That is kind of brutal.” She can see Delphine shrinking back, and immediately places a mollifying hand on her shoulder. “But how could you believe that? You guys are, like, internationally _adored_. You went from a-dime-a-dozen to the biggest band in the world in just a few months’ time. That’s incredible.”

Delphine laughs, a bit humorlessly. “Well, ‘biggest band in the world’ may be an overstatement.”

“Okay, well… don’t nitpick. You get my point.” She pauses for a moment, softening her tone. “People _love_ you. I mean— _really_ love you. Don’t read that highbrow bullshit. Go check out your message boards; search your Tumblr tags.” She pauses for a moment, and knows it is because of the envy. She can’t help it. “You’ll find plenty of people saying that you’ve changed their lives, that your music _saved_ them. Hundreds of people. Thousands. A publication like _The New Yorker_ may be well-respected, but it doesn’t have heart. And that’s the only thing that really matters.”

Delphine looks at her then, the neutrality foregone. Her eyes sparkle, perhaps with tears, but they are lost in her grin. “I don’t think you have to worry about ‘selling out,’ Cosima.”

She returns Delphine’s smile, her hand moving to her back. “I hope not.” They watch each other for a moment before Cosima catches her hand drifting lower, and pulls away suddenly. Delphine seems not to have noticed. “Well, uh—are you feeling better now?”

“Honestly?” Delphine pauses, considering this. “Yes.”

Cosima smiles wider. “Good. I’m glad.” Suddenly, she stands, taking a deep breath. “Because I really do have to pee.” Delphine laughs loudly, honestly, her eyes slightly apologetic.

“Oh, no. That is what you came in here for, wasn’t it?”

“Yeah,” Cosima nods eagerly, walking towards the bathroom. “And, trust me, I’m more than happy to comfort beautiful French rock stars, but seriously? I chugged over two cups of coffee before I came in here.”

Five minutes later, they walk into the diner to the complaints of their bandmates. They don’t mind the endless ragging so much as they slide into the booth, sitting across from each other. Delphine looks a bit sheepish, but Cosima has no shame. She grins at Delphine intermittently as they eat, unable to help herself, just hoping the blonde doesn’t catch her. Once or twice, she does. The truth is, she may not be able to help herself either.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, posting a little early, but I've got a busy weekend ahead, and didn't want to wait until Monday. Thank you all so much for your lovely comments. I was really enjoying writing this to begin with, but your enthusiasm makes it even better.


	4. Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The original chapter four ended up longer than I'd anticipated, so I decided to split it up. Which was probably not necessary, but it gives you guys a little chapter in the middle of the week, so why not? I hope you enjoy. And thank so much for the reviews so far!

Sometimes Cosima wonders why she is even friends with Sarah and Felix—Sarah especially. On stage, they back her with the fluency and precision of two seasoned professionals. She doubts that if she were somehow able to throw clones of herself on drums and bass that they'd be able to keep up any better. It's understandable that she values their talent, puts up with them during those long hours cramped inside the van.

What they share is much more than that though. Her respect for them, her affection, does not cease at the extent of their musical abilities. In the past few days, as she's been building up her confidence, she's leaned on them emotionally. Had they not been there, she doesn't think she would've been able to play. Hell, if not for them, she never would've signed up for this gig in the first place.

If not for them, she would have been homeless after dropping out of college, too, in those bleak couple of months where her parents had cut her off financially, refused to speak with her. If not for her friends' encouragement, she never would have felt secure enough to take that risk in the first place.

There are a lot of things she never would have done without them – granted, some of them illicit, or embarrassing, but most, very good. Like it or not, they've been a part of her, almost from the day they met. They've made her laugh, made her more herself than anyone she's ever known before. They've had her back in the worst of times, and will continue to do so. She loves them, unconditionally.

Of course, that doesn't mean she never dislikes them. Particularly now, as they're hollering raucously from the _Independent Release_ section of a record store in Portland, goading Beth Childs to take a picture of them while Felix holds one of Nautilus' record sleeves in front of his face – the one that has Cosima's moody visage artfully rendered on the cover – and Sarah makes licentious gestures at it, shouting, "Ooh, rock me, Amadeus!"

Really, she can't take them anywhere. Maybe she wouldn't mind so much if it was just the three of them, but with Beth and Delphine in tow, the entire outing has been all the more humiliating.

The moment Beth decides to join in the photo, exclaiming, _"This is definitely going on our twitter,"_ Cosima decides it might be best for her to just leave the store altogether. As she turns to walk out, however, she collides instantly with another body.

"Hello," Delphine giggles, placing her hands firmly on Cosima's shoulders to help keep their balance.

"Sorry!" Cosima throws her hands up, turning instantly crimson. "I didn't mean to—uhm, sorry."

"It's okay." Delphine peeks over her shoulder towards their bandmates. Beth and Sarah each now have an arm around Felix's shoulders, kissing the record sleeve's cheeks. Delphine giggles again before looking down at Cosima apologetically. "Maybe we should get you out of here?"

"Where do you think I was running off to?"

"Yeah," Delphine laughs, placing a hand at Cosima's back and steering her towards the door. "C'mon." As they walk out, the other three begin shouting at them crudely, the bearded man behind the register looking up from his magazine to shoot them dirty looks.

"Thanks," Cosima says, the moment the door closes behind them.

"Walk with me," Delphine says, eyes sparkling excitedly, tugging at Cosima's sweater sleeve.

"Okay." She doesn't ask where Delphine is taking her as they walk down the street. The blonde's hair gleams in the sunlight, her pale cheeks lightly flushed. Cosima likes following her, even blindly. She doesn't worry about impending mischief, or embarrassment.

"Sarah and Felix seem to pick on you an awful lot," Delphine notes.

"Yeah, well… they're my best friends, believe it or not. They can get away with it."

"It never bothers you?"

Cosima snorts. "It annoys the shit out of me. But, what can I say," she shrugs as Delphine slows to a halt in front of an antique shop. "I'm not sure if you've gotten this vibe from me yet, but I'm pretty easy to pick on." The blonde smiles, pulling a carton of cigarettes from her jacket pocket. Cosima had been surprised to find out she smoked. Willowy, demure—she didn't seem like the type. Nevertheless, seeing the blonde's lips pucker around the filter, cheeks hollowing on the inhale, Cosima's stomach clenches painfully at the sight, her mouth dry. _Shake it off_ , she tells herself. "When Sarah and Felix pick on me, it's just for a laugh. Sarah would kick the shit out of anybody else if she saw them doing it."

"Not Felix," Delphine asks, blowing smoke to the side of Cosima's face. She shivers.

"Felix would instigate. He doesn't really like to get his hands dirty. Not in that way, at least."

Delphine seems to consider this for a moment, watching the cars passing on the quiet street, bikers pedaling by. "I like them. They remind of Beth."

Cosima laughs. "Yeah, they might be getting along a little _too_ well."

"It's good," Delphine decides. "She can get a bit stuffy when she's stuck with Art and Paul all the time. Especially Paul."

"Yeah, what's up with those two?"

The blonde shrugs. "Nobody really knows. I think they started sleeping together again a few weeks ago—just sleeping together though. Neither of them is miserable enough to be dating again."

"Wow," Cosima chuckles, "sounds like it's meant to be."

Delphine raises her eyebrows, taking one last drag off her cigarette before disposing of it. "It's complicated, I suppose. I'm in no place to judge," she mutters, and Cosima assumes she means—as their bandmate. She doesn't dwell on it when Delphine waves her inside. "Come look with me."

Five different bells jingle overhead with the opening of the door. Aside from a sleepy looking old man playing solitaire behind the register, there is nobody else in the store. He greets them politely as they pass, but quickly returns to his cards.

The shop is charmingly cluttered – tiny, and seeming even tinier with the wall-to-wall racks crammed with antiques, items climbing towards the ceiling. The room smells of dust and patchouli. Inhaling, Cosima can't help but be reminded of the way her grandfather's house used to smell. She smiles at Delphine, who has already wandered off to the nearest rack, entranced by an old trunk on the floor.

"You can store all your booty in there," Cosima remarks, padding up quietly behind her. The blonde, having squatted down to inspect the trunk, looks up at her with a confused expression. "It looks like a pirate chest."

"Huh…" Delphine fingers the lock carefully, popping open the top to inspect the inner compartments. "I guess it does."

"There. The perfect place to store all of your doubloons. Or Grammy awards," Cosima says, inspecting a set of crystal brandy glasses a couple shelves down.

"Oh, c'mon," Delphine mutters, rolling her eyes. Cosima smirks, picking up one of the glasses and holding it in her palm. _Sarah and Fee would get a kick out of these_ , she thinks, _drinking that shitty bourbon_. "And what would you store in here?"

Cosima glances at her sidelong, picking up an ornate set of cutlery. "Weed," she says bluntly.

"Weed?"

"I don't know," Cosima shrugs. "Maybe I'd stash my vibrators, too." Delphine laughs, but her cheeks redden at the comment. Cosima's eyes narrow slightly, accompanying a sly grin. The blonde is much shyer than she lets on, it seems. She strolls around the corner rack, spotting an old milk crate on the floor, loaded with records.

"Oh, jackpot." Cosima rifles through them, running her fingers over the worn sleeves, pulling out one of the vinyls to inspect its scratches. She can already hear them _pop-crack_ ling under the needle, the way her father always told her they were meant to be heard. She glances at the price tag—$5. She now has another reason to be glad they left the stuffy record store down the street.

She's lifting one of the records beneath her nose, sniffing the yellowed paper as Delphine kneels down beside her.

"What are you doing?"

Cosima startles slightly. There is very little room in this corner of the shop. Not quite so little that Delphine's elbow _has_ to be rubbing hers, she notes, but very little, nonetheless.

"Smelling it," she says without shame, and lifts the record under Delphine's nose. "Here." Tentatively, the blonde takes a whiff, and gives her a small smile.

"Musty." She reaches forward to flick through the stack. "But not so different from flipping the pages of a book, just for the scent, I suppose."

"Right?" Cosima glances at her profile. This close, and in this lighting, she can see all the little details. The precise length of her lashes, the beauty mark under her bottom lip, the slender slope of her nose. Cosima's breath nearly catches with the sudden desire to run her finger along the contour of the other woman's cheekbone. _For shit's sake, Cos_. She blinks, biting her own tongue.

She's getting used to the way her stomach constantly seems to twist around Delphine, the pleasant surges of warmth that arrest her, ebbing over her body in mellifluous currents. Though there are moments of cloying intensity, she's mostly been able to ascribe the feeling to some form of admiration, or even gratitude, for the opportunities this woman has allowed her.

She thinks back to the perfect circle Delphine's lips had formed around her cigarette earlier, and the physical pain it had caused her; the graceful roll of her wrists when she's drumming, the way her hair bounces; the length and lithe curling of her fingers, even now, as they flip through the records in the crate.

Cosima sucks in a quick breath through her nose, hoping it inconspicuous. Her entire body flushes suddenly, and she has to consciously ward off the sensuous thoughts that beg for contemplation.

She's not really _used_ to anything, is the problem. Despite the odd feeling of comfort that seems to lighten and expand in her chest whenever Delphine is near, she can't help but feel strangely uprooted, as well, a sense of newness imbuing itself in the familiarity that the other woman presents.

Delphine is a contradiction. And Cosima cannot resist the temptation to reconcile her.

"See anything you like?"

"Huh?" Cosima's entire body tenses when she snaps back at Delphine's words, feeling abruptly as if she's been caught, red-handed; as if her utter fascination has been painted plainly across her forehead.

But Delphine isn't looking at her. Cosima follows her line of sight down to the record crate, and quickly shakes her head.

"Oh, yeah… some good ones in there." She wraps her arms around her knees, resting her chin on them as she wills herself to focus. _Don't think. Don't think about wanting to sleep with the way-out-of-your-league rock star. Don't_ —"Hey." Her hand rushes forward to stop Delphine from flipping the next record, setting her fingers reverently on the sleeve.

"Good one?"

" _Love Is the Thing_ ," Cosima says, picking up the record. She smiles, a sense of nostalgia seizing her—not just from the smell of her Pap's house wafting about, but from the familiar cover art that she'd gazed at so many times as a kid. "My pap loved Nat King Cole. One of his favorites." She pauses. "When he passed away, his turntable and record collection were among the things he left my dad. And when I was a kid… I was obsessed with those records. So different from cassettes, or CDs. I thought they were amazing. I used to just spread them all out on the living room floor and study the covers." She looks up and Delphine is smiling at her. Holding out her hand, the blonde gestures shyly towards the record.

"May I?"

"Of course." Cosima hands it to her gently. She studies the sleeve, too, turning it over to read the track list.

"You really love music, don't you?"

"Well, yeah," Cosima chuckles.

Delphine shakes her head gently, a slight furrow in her brow. "No, I don't just mean… not just the sound of it. Not just the way a song can get stuck in your head." She pauses, choosing her words carefully, still reading the back of the record. "I see you when you play. You transform. I mean… you just come alive. And I think—that is not just someone who likes music, who loves it… cosmetically. That is someone who breathes for it, who breathes _with_ it." She pauses, smiling a bit sadly, and hands the record back to Cosima.

"There is a difference, between worship and… complete surrender." She laughs at herself, cheeks reddening. "Sorry—that is a terribly dramatic analogy—"

"No," Cosima assures her, resting a hand on Delphine's wrist. Her touch burns. "I get it. It's like… My mom always said—there's a difference between a career and a calling. One you work for. The other, you're born for." She thinks that probably sounds equally as dramatic; but Delphine looks up with her eyes alight in total understanding.

"Yes. Exactly." She glances down quickly—just for a second—at Cosima's hand on her wrist before she continues. "You love music, not because you… admire it. But because it is a part of you."

"Well… if I wasn't doing it every day, I'd be in total misery. And I'm not just saying that—I've been there. So—I don't know. I think you might be right about that." Delphine turns her head away for a moment, placing her chin in her fist, looking almost melancholy. Cosima wants to say something, to ask about it, but before she can, Delphine is snatching the record back from her and standing.

"I have to buy this for you."

"No, you don't," Cosima says, standing, too, waving her hands as if to decline. She does so because it is what she has been taught is the polite thing to do. But in truth, she wants Delphine to buy the record for her, and not because she doesn't want to spend the money herself. She simply wants to have something that Delphine wanted to give to her.

"Well, I'm going to." And Cosima can't protest, because Delphine's long legs have carried her to the register before she has a chance to. She can't even feign a frown as the blonde hands her the shopping bag.


	5. Five

Felix truly doesn't get the credit he deserves for putting up with Sarah and Cosima – his sisters, both of them, though neither by blood. He's sure either of them would say the same about _themselves_ , but both share an uncanny level of stubbornness that practically canonizes him by virtue of simply _dealing_ with it.

It's fairly obvious how difficult Sarah is. One only has to spend a few hours in her presence to realize it. Cosima, on the other hand, does an incredible job of seeming completely humble. He's watched her during interviews, seen her interact with large crowds. She comes off mild-mannered, sweetly intelligent, jittery—not at all like motor-mouthed, know-it-all of a dork that he has to sit in a sweaty van with for hours every day. There's times when he finds them both to be insufferable.

Cosima and Sarah have more than just their faults in common, however. They both share tremendous redeeming qualities. Fierce loyalty, thoughtfulness (though in varying degrees), cunning. Cosima tends to be more obvious than Sarah when it comes to these traits. She wears her heart proudly on her sleeve. For the most part, it makes her unbearably endearing. On other occasions though, he can only cringe while she flounders about, giving away too much.

It's a miracle, he thinks, that Delphine is as oblivious as Cosima is obvious; otherwise, this shit-show would have turned sour before they ever had the chance to step foot on a stage.

He sighs, swirling the bourbon left at the bottom of his snifter. In Vitro's tour bus, spacious as it may be, is still too crowded for this sort of unresolved tension. He's not sure what the hell went on between Cosima and Delphine after they fled from the record store yesterday, but his front-woman has been acting oddly ever since.

And when he says _oddly_ he means awkward and sexually frustrated. Practically sprouting a tail, simply so she can wag it anytime Delphine so much as glances at her. Though he barely knows Cormier, he can read her easily enough to know she's been feeling a bit odd herself. Stymied by the natural polarity, maybe—whatever it is that makes her glance at Cosima every ten seconds anytime they're in the same room as each other.

He sighs a bit more melodramatically, downing his bourbon. Out of the corner of his eye, he can see Sarah falling into the scruffy tech guy's lap with a distinct lack of aplomb, drops of liquor sloshing out of her glass and onto his flannel shirt. Cal looks more surprised by her forwardness than he does aggravated. _Poor thing,_ Felix thinks. Sarah will eat him alive.

Now, if only seduction could be that easy for Cosima. He's always supposed there's something inherently more relaxed about it when you're both that—well, unabashedly _straight._ Granted, he's as far from that as one can be, and flirtation has never posed much of a challenge for him. Maybe he's just that good.

Smirking, he stands to pour himself another drink. Across from Sarah and Cal, Beth and Paul seem to be skirting the same precipice – albeit, with a great deal more bickering. Whatever they're picking at each other about drowns out the quiet conversation Art had been trying to hold with Delphine.

Cosima had ducked out fifteen minutes ago—needed to think, she'd told him, as if he wouldn't see through that—needed to have a smoke. It was for the best, probably. Her little crush is starting to turn into something more, it seems, something complicated. The good thing about Cosima though, he's learned, is that she's usually smart enough to see these things coming.

 _Usually_. Other times her sentimentality gets the better of her. If Delphine had the level of awareness to reel her into it, he might be more concerned, but—

"Felix?"

"Mhm?" _Speak of the devil._ He turns, glancing curiously at the blonde as she stands with her arms crossed.

"Did Cosima—" She bites her lower lip, probably without even realizing it, and Felix's stomach drops a little. _Bollocks,_ he thinks. _This might be out of Cos' hands._ "—is she coming back?"

"Oh, sure. Just went out for a smoke." He places his arm around her waist, steering her towards the couch. "Is your glass empty?"

"I don't have a—"

"Well, that's no good," he tuts, clicking his tongue as he sits her down. Her lips are parted slightly in surprise, eyes rounded. _"Mother Mary's tits,"_ he mutters to himself, quickly pouring wine into a glass. He gets it, really—understands why this is so difficult for Cosima. Delphine thanks him a bit bashfully when he places the glass in her hand, her cheeks already reddened. "Cheers?" He holds out his glass to her, and they clink.

"Cheers." For a few minutes they sip their drinks quietly together, Delphine glancing at her phone every minute or so. After five minutes pass, she downs her wine suddenly and stands. "I think I might have a cigarette, too," she tells him, retrieving her carton from the jacket slung over the chair opposite them.

He leans forward in his seat for a moment, as if he might reach out and stop her. _"She wanted to be alone,"_ he should tell her. Of course, then she'd probably need to know why, oblivious thing she is. He sighs.

In order to stop whatever _this_ is from happening – or, more likely, from blowing up in someone's face – he'd have to police them for the entire month. Even then, he can't stop them from texting, from making eyes at each other across a room.

One naïve, one over-conscious. It's a terrible mix, in his experience. If Delphine's intentions were malicious, maybe he'd reach out, grab her by the wrist, and tell her not to go. But she's ignorant. Not even she knows what she's doing to _herself_ right now.

So, instead, he rolls his eyes and says, "Tell Cos to get her ass back here when you're done." Delphine doesn't even have the wherewithal to protest.

* * *

 

With half of their instrument cases tucked into the storage compartment of In Vitro's bus, the remaining crates pushed against the edges of the van, there's just enough room for Cosima to lay flat on her back. The small, portable turntable her dad had given her for her seventeenth birthday lies beside her, spinning _Love Is the Thing_ as her joint burns slowly in hand, filling the vehicle with heady smoke.

She should feel at peace here, in the sanctity of her solitude; but try as she might to ignore it, she's still restless. Even with the high dipping into her bones, Nat King Cole's smooth voice curling tenderly about her, it's impossible to ignore. Her body begs for motion. It's starting to feel less like anxiety, and more like longing.

She closes her eyes and wants to picture herself—smaller, her tiny hands stretched out before her, placing this same record gently on the turntable for the first time. She wants to remember the way it made her feel then, at seven-years-old, when her body would vibrate with a constant energy, anxious without reason. She was too _spirited_ —even the doctor had said it. He wanted to medicate her, to dose her with loads of Ritalin. Her parents disagreed. Instead, they sat her beside the record player with a pair of her mom's old headphones and told her to listen. When they understood the depth to which it soothed her, they brought a piano home and told her to play.

She's not sure what exactly happened the first time she laid hands on an instrument. She just knows that she stopped running circles around the house then, stopped pumping her legs until her body would fall limp, mind still whirring; stopped panicking so badly on the school bus that she would lose her breath.

So she tries, _really,_ to picture her own hands, and the stillness that would arrest them when that needle dropped into the groove. But instead, she sees Delphine's, stealing the record from her grasp, gazing at her with that resolute warmth that offers kindness without condition.

Her eyes are clenching when she hears the knock at the window, causing her to startle. Her stomach clenches, too, when she sees the face that had stuck fast to the backs of her eyelids, staring at her on the other side of the glass.

She doesn't hesitate like she should. Without a thought, she slides the door open a crack, and tugs on Delphine's sleeve.

"Get in quick. Before we let all the smoke out."

"Okay," Delphine giggles, practically stumbling into the cramped van as Cosima shuts the door swiftly behind her. The pall of smoke is almost overwhelming when she sits down, coughing a little bit. She can see the joint still held between Cosima's fingers, hear the light music filling the van. "You have a record player in here?"

"My to-go player. Perfect van companion." Cosima grins, bringing the joint to her lips. Before she takes a hit, she stops, glancing uncertainly at Delphine. "Is it okay if I—"

"Of course. I wouldn't come in here and tell you to stop smoking."

"Oh, good point. That'd be, like, kind of rude," she chuckles, eyes lighting slowly. Delphine is not exactly sure, as she doesn't spend much time around people who do drugs, but she thinks that Cosima is already rather high. The glaze in her earnest brown eyes says as much, her limbs caught between lethargy and riotous energy. Sitting this close to her, Delphine can already feel her body humming. "Do you want any?"

"Uhm, I don't—"

"No pressure—seriously. But I'm totally willing to share, if you want."

"Maybe another night?" Delphine wraps her arms around her knees. Suddenly she remembers the cigarette carton in her back pocket, and pulls it out. "Do you mind if I smoke?"

"Yeah, of course. Go for it. Need a light?"

"Could you?"

"Sure." Leaning forward, Cosima plucks the cigarette gently from between Delphine's lips, and touches the tip to the cherry of her joint. She puffs slowly, until the cigarette lights. With what she fears is an almost awkward delicacy, she places the cigarette back in the blonde's mouth.

Two different kinds of smoke fill Delphine's lungs when she inhales, feeling instantly light-headed. Cosima withdraws her hand more slowly than she thinks she does. Delphine's throat tightens as she watches it drift away. "Thank you."

"Yeah, uh—no problem," Cosima tells her, offering a goofy salute.

Delphine suddenly can't remember why she came out here. To smoke, she'd told herself, but she knows that isn't quite true. She didn't like that Cosima had wandered off alone—not that she needs to be looked after—particularly not by Delphine, of all people. But there are times when they're all together, drinking, wasting time on the bus, that Cosima just doesn't seem entirely present. It's never like that when they're alone. In fact, Delphine is in constant fascination of the way Cosima seems tethered to the moment in times such as this. Careful, careless times.

So, she wanted to make sure she was all right. However, it was more compulsion than desire, more necessity than uncertainty. Why—she's not sure. She doesn't want to think about it. Doesn't want to make this into something it's not (and is not sure what that something would even be). Doesn't want to endure the after-show party if Cosima isn't there enjoying it, too.

What she wants is for this cigarette to burn for a very long time.

She sees the sleeve of the album she purchased yesterday sitting beside the record player. "This is the album?"

"Yeah," Cosima says excitedly, blowing smoke. "Almost over though. You want to listen a little bit?" Delphine nods. "Okay, well—" The brunette leans over, closer to the other woman than she's ever been. She ignores the flush of her limbs as she brushes past her shoulder. "Excuse my reach…"

Delphine goes entirely still as Cosima bends over her, joint bobbing between her teeth, and flips the record with expert precision. Beyond the scent of pot and nicotine, she swears she can smell her. Faintly herbal, earthy and clean. She wants to suck in a deep breath. Instead, she drags masochistically on her cigarette.

"Sorry," Cosima apologizes, her body withdrawing. "You bought the record, so I'll let you do the honors. Drop the needle whenever you want."

"Okay…" Delphine doesn't even breathe until Cosima is sitting opposite her again. When she finally does, it dizzies her, like drawing thin air. "I think I might be getting a little high," she says dumbly.

"Contact high," Cosima chuckles, the tip of her tongue poking between her teeth. Delphine finds it infinitely distracting. "I'm not sure if you've noticed, but it's a little smoky in here."

"I noticed," Delphine drawls. For a moment they simply grin at each other, until Cosima takes another small hit and points at the record player.

"Put it on," she says eagerly, her voice low and strained as she speaks through the smoke held in her lungs. Blushing slightly, Delphine carefully drops the needle on the already spinning vinyl.

The first song is slow—dulcet strings over a soft, plucky bass-line and brushed percussion. She's listened to Nat King Cole before – perhaps not so attentively, but in passing, certainly. "Smile"—she knows that song. This one she's never heard before.

"Lean back," Cosima says quietly, staring at the roof of the van.

"Hmm?" The brunette looks at her, holding her gaze as she lies back against a crate, stretching her legs to rest beside Delphine's thighs. The blonde mimics her, relaxing against the backseat. Cosima takes another hit, eyes fluttering closed, and rests her arm over Delphine's legs.

Cosima is humming then, voice deepened – maybe by the smoke, or the angle of her spine – in a sweet accompaniment to the album's calm crooning. Delphine takes another slow drag off her cigarette, head lolling to her shoulder. She stares out the clouded window, gazing at the tall lamps that burn a hazy orange in the midnight mists.

" _In a restless world, like this is/Love is ended before it's begun/And too many moonlight kisses/Seem to cool in the warmth of the sun."_

"What is this song," she asks quietly, unsure that Cosima will even hear her. She feels pleasantly sleepy, all of a sudden.

"'When I Fall In Love,'" Cosima sing-songs, almost teasingly. "The old love songs—they're nothing like what you hear today. They could totally ruin you."

"What do you mean," Delphine asks, rolling her head to glance at her.

"Just listen. It's not at all about sex. It's not about a feeling that starts and stops. Just once and done." She ashes her joint on one of the crates, crooking her body to lie down fully. The van's floor is cool against her cheek, flushed as her entire body is. " _'Forever,'_ he says. I don't know about you, but I could never sing that with conviction. I don't know anybody who could," she mutters.

"Non?" Delphine's brow furrows.

Cosima pauses for a long moment before answering. "No. Could you?"

The blonde's eyes close. She wants to say yes. "Probably not," she tells her instead.

"I don't know how the oldies did it. Maybe they were lying."

The song has ended, and with it, Delphine's cigarette. She inhales down to the filter, snubbing the butt on a crate, just as Cosima had, and slips it into her pocket, a feeling of hollowness creeping into her chest. Despite the lights outside, it seems darker in here than it had before.

"I don't think they were lying," she tells Cosima. It's partially untrue. She doesn't really know what to think. She's never cared much for love songs. They're not what In Vitro are known for, in any case. But she wants to disabuse Cosima of her doubts.

"Yeah? I don't really think they were either, to be honest." Cosima sits up on her elbows, a goofy little smile spreading across her face. "I try hard to be cynical sometimes."

"Why," Delphine asks, eyes tracing the shadows that half cloak her face, swathing her cheeks softly. Cosima is irradiated by the moonlight that leaks in through the windows, she thinks. Vibrant. _Beautiful._ Her cheeks burn in the darkness.

The brunette shrugs. "Seems more practical, in some situations. Never works out for me though." She grins at Delphine, pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose. "I don't know how some people do it. Cynicism is so… boring."

"It is, isn't it?" The people Delphine spends the most time with—they'd tell her it is _smart_. Which is funny, because, now that she's thinking about it, those people tend to make her want to turn in early most nights. They make her want to leave the party before the lights go down; to never step out from behind the anonymity of her kit.

She laughs then, without provocation. "It's _so_ fucking boring," she tells Cosima, giggling stupidly. Not caring.

It's an unusual conclusion for her to arrive at, but as the rhythm of the record picks up, Cosima laughing with her, tongue between her teeth once again, Delphine wonders if maybe she's been spending her time on the wrong people.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thank you for the reviews! I'd like to switch things up a little bit next chapter so you can get things from Delphine's POV a bit more.


	6. Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heads up: I am now posting this fic on tumblr, as well, at soundreason-truereligion(dot)tumblr(dot)com if you prefer that format.

"So, what's she _taste_ like?" Cosima is so deeply entrenched in her own thoughts that the sudden intrusion of Sarah's voice makes her jump, nearly dropping her hastily microwaved lunch in the process.

She whirls around, cheeks already aflame, and sputters, "Excuse me?"

Sarah, smirking crookedly, baring her canines, leans against the doorframe, arms crossed cockily over her chest. Behind her, Cal stands with his hands in his pockets, glancing uncomfortably at something down the corridor.

"Just curious…" Her eyes glint with dangerously familiar mischief, instantly setting Cosima on edge. She sets the plate on the counter, ready to refute whatever licentious suggestion Sarah has prepared, but the drummer beats her to it. "Don't tell me you haven't. The two of you spent longer in that van last night than Cal and I—" She directs her thumb brusquely over her shoulder, catching the poor man's attention. "—spent in the tech booth."

"Sarah—" Even though his hand is on the drummer's shoulder, Cal is looking at Cosima, apology in his eyes.

"I'm just saying." She throws up her hands, shrugging at Cal. "Cos might seem all bashful when she's not on a stage, but she can be charming when she wants to be. Right?" She looks bluntly at Cosima, encouragement written over her features. In her own way, Sarah means well – Cosima knows this. Her crass barbs are a vote of confidence. And while they aren't necessarily insulting, or even particularly embarrassing, they twist her stomach in anxiety nevertheless—a feverish clench of the gut that becomes more familiar with each passing day.

"I'm not trying to get into her pants," Cosima says flatly, eyes darting between them with a mild sort of desperation, much to Sarah's incredulity. "I like her," she croaks suddenly. "I mean—she's my friend."

Sarah's eyes narrow. For a moment, she simply gawps at Cosima before turning to Cal and patting him on the chest. "I'll meet you on the bus in a few minutes, yeah?"

"Sure." He nods eagerly, glancing at Cosima before hurriedly retreating.

Sarah takes her time strolling into the room. As she sidles up to the counter, picking up the plate of pizza bagels left abandoned there, Cosima eyes her warily. Perhaps she should feel some sense of defiance at this invasion, but instead she feels oddly vulnerable – open to scrutiny.

The drummer picks up one of the pizza bagels, inspecting it between thumb and forefinger with a slight frown. "These are still half frozen," she observes, before popping the bagel into her mouth. Cosima can only shrug. Undercooked or not, Sarah scarfs down a second in quick succession, strutting over to the dressing room couch and plopping down unceremoniously.

"So…" she drawls, eyes never leaving her claimed pizza bagels. "No sex?"

"No," Cosima answers cautiously, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Well, not yet at least," Sarah supplies through a mouth full of food, wiping pizza grease on her torn, black jeans. She looks up at Cosima, cocking her head in expectation of a denial. When it is stubbornly refused, the drummer sighs, setting the plate down on the table before her, and rests her elbows on her knees. "Because you like her."

"…Yeah."

"You know that could be bad news."

"Well, so could _you_ sleeping with a nice guy like Cal. But I haven't said a thing about it, have I?"

Sarah smirks at her wryly. "'Cept for just now." Cosima shrugs. "All right. That one could turn messy—I'll give you that." She steals another pizza bagel before pushing the plate towards the edge of the table in offering. With some trepidation, Cosima snatches up her lunch, and sits down on the edge of the coffee table, facing the wall. "The thing about Cal though, is that nobody really knows who he is."

"So?" Cosima nibbles slowly at one of the pizza bagels, frowning as she bites into frost.

"You don't see how that could potentially complicate things?" Cosima chews her food with deliberate slowness. "Not just emotionally. But professionally." Sarah waits, guilt sinking into her gut. She's not known for her practicality—not often the bearer of bad news—and she doesn't relish dashing Cosima's hopes; but she can't allow her best friend to walk into something she might regret either – at least not without thinking it all the way through first.

She expects Cosima to relent, for her better judgment to kick in. What she doesn't expect is the flippancy with which she exclaims, "I think she's into me."

"Seriously?" _Of course_ _she is,_ Sarah thinks. _But that doesn't mean shit._

"Yeah." Cosima glances over her shoulder, smiling shyly. "And I think I should make a move."

"Cos." Sarah thinks Cosima might actually be joking—until her smile cracks open, eyes lighting in that impossibly sincere Cosima way. "You gotta be fucking kidding me."

"Why," she laughs.

"Oi." Sarah smacks her knee, shoving her until she swivels around to face her fully. "I thought you weren't trying to get into her pants?"

"I'm not. I mean—if it happens…" Sarah groans. "When I say 'move' I just mean… make my feelings known."

" _Make your feelings known_? Cos—every time she walks into the room you light up like the goddamn Las Vegas strip. I don't think you could advertise any more clearly."

"Oh, c'mon," Cosima frowns, swatting her away.

"I'm not kidding. Short of buying a billboard, I don't think there's much more you can do."

"If I was _that_ obvious, I think she would have said something by now."

Sarah throws up her hands in disbelief. "And _why_ would you think that? She's bloody famous. She's got a career to think about."

"You know—" Cosima stands up suddenly, her irritation flaring. "I don't think that's it. We've been talking a lot—"

"Well, stop the damn presses," Sarah shouts, kicking her boots up onto the vacant coffee table with a sneer.

"She's got _priorities_."

"I bet she does," Sarah sarcastically accedes. "Which reminds me—Paul told me they've got some reporter from _Rolling Stone_ stopping by before the show later. They're gonna want to talk to us—want some bloody testament to In Vitro's personal greatness, I bet. I'm sure _you'll_ give a _glowing_ testimonial."

Cosima wrinkles her nose, putting her hands on her hips. "What are you implying, exactly?"

Sarah shrugs, crossing her arms. "They're a little out of touch with the underground, don't you think? Unlike Nautilus…"

Cosima scoffs. "Really?"

"I'm just saying. You're an easy in."

"Fuck off."

"I'm just looking out for you."

Cosima stalks towards the door, throwing up her hands dramatically. "You've got an _exceptional_ way of showing it."

"Just because I don't coddle you—" Before she can even finish that statement, Cosima is rounding the corner. For a second, her temper burning, Sarah debates running after her. Instead, she petulantly grabs the plate from the table, and shouts, "I'm gonna eat your fucking Bagel Bites!"

As she stuffs them into her mouth, she hears an echoed reply from down the hall. "They taste like shit anyway!" Nevertheless, as Sarah double fists them, nearly choking in her aggravation, she feels some sense of satisfaction.

Falling back into the couch cushions, mouth full, she curses at the ceiling. _"Bitch."_

* * *

Grand-mère's hands were the color and consistency of paper. Delphine can remember holding them in her own, running the pads of her thumbs over the wrinkles that would crease in her skin as finely as tissue. They had fit perfectly in her own at the end—the width of her palms, the length of each digit—just another thing they had in common.

 _The fingers of a pianist_ , Grand-mère had so often mused, a note of pride in her voice. In her mind, Delphine can still see the woman sitting at the upright piano next to the window seat, patting the bench beside her as she would say, _"Come, play with me."_ The muted light streaming through the lace curtains would swaddle her in a softness that the passage of time, of memory, has made ethereal.

Delphine was small enough then that when she would obey, walking timidly to her side, the piano bench would rise to her belly. Small enough that when the woman would lift her with a heaving sigh, a chuckled, _"You are getting too big for my little old bones,"_ and place her on the bench, her shining ringlets would bob against Grand-mère's shoulder.

Small enough, even, that when the woman would guide Delphine's fingers over the keys, humming sweet and airily, the girl's entire hand would fit beneath her open palm.

Grand-mère always had a tune in her mouth, a constant melody that would curl her lips in a grin. Music was a science—ordered chaos, rhyme for reason. All emotion equated to a progression of chords, to a sequence of notes. For her, it was the only way that things made sense. That—Delphine could understand.

She was quiet as a child. Mild-mannered and impossibly shy. Obedient to the point that her intellect was sometimes called into question. In truth, her silence was mostly the byproduct of an overly-keen sense of observation, a sharp mind. She saw more than she ought to have, thought more of it than was necessary. It was overwhelming.

The music was not. The music was symmetry—was simplicity and peace. Was Grand-mère's smile.

Until Grand-mère stopped smiling. Until her mind, her memory deteriorated parallel to the exceptional development of her granddaughter's. Until she couldn't remember Delphine's face, much less her name.

It had happened quickly, within a span of several months; had probably been a long time coming. The warning signs were innocuous—the same story, retold; a lost key or purse; forgotten days, weeks—but then, it seemed that she blinked and was met with another woman entirely.

Grand-mère had struck her once. Hard, in the mouth – all because Delphine had refused to eat her vegetables at dinner one night. That was when they knew. The sting of it had paled compared to the way Grand-mère had looked at her that evening, with a momentary sense of vacancy, of unknowing.

As Delphine stands before the synthesizer now set up on the empty stage, right hand flowing seamlessly from key to key while her left hand dials knobs, presses buttons, she can still feel it—that ache. Much duller, almost in the way her right wrist, the one she'd broken while rollerblading in middle school, sometimes still aches with the rain. She supposes it will always be there.

Grand-mère didn't always know her, in the end. Sitting across from her at the table, sipping tea, she would look at Delphine with the same malformed sense of recognition one may gaze at a stranger in passing, on a crowded street—a knowing that bears no gravity, that doesn't stop one from walking on to the next block. Delphine was a little older then—old enough to understand why Grand-mère couldn't remember her—but young enough to feel a sense of rejection from it.

That was at the table though, over teas and cakes and obligatory, repetitive conversation. Delphine was a stranger there; but on the days that she could convince the woman to sit with her on the piano bench, Delphine's hands guiding hers over a familiar melody, they were both remembered. The melody would bring it all back, and then Grand-mère would smile, eyes glistening. The girl would be Delphine again, and her grand-mère would whisper, _"My girl. Never stop playing, my girl."_ —and she wouldn't.

Until she did.

Her eyes are shut as she brings the song to a close. When they finally open, the echoes of her own composition dying in the cheap-seats, it is to the image of a gaping, red-cheeked Cosima, who is holding a large case in each hand.

Her heart thumps. It is not an adult feeling of being caught, of moral or emotional error; rather, it is the childish _red-handed_ – a little embarrassed, a little wary of rejection and reprimand. Very few people outside of her own bandmates are privy to her personal compositions. Even they are not privy _often._

There's something frightening about Cosima listening to her music. Cosima, who is so talented, so critical, so utterly genuine. And, at this moment, so very difficult to read.

"Dude," Cosima breathes out quietly, before her eyes widen, and she sets the cases down on the stage. Her hands erupt in a flurry of placating motion as she steps forward. "I didn't mean to, like, eavesdrop on you. You look totally spooked."

"I, uhm…" Delphine doesn't know what to say. She feels oddly nude.

"But—I mean—honestly?" Cosima spins the rings on her fingers as she steps forward, voice dropping almost conspiratorially. She stops a few feet away, and gazes at Delphine without even a hint of guile. "I didn't know you played keys, too. You're _really_ good. And _that_ sounded… gorgeous."

"Oh," Delphine breathes out, almost too relieved to manage a smile. She sets her hand down over the synthesizer, glancing at the blinking lights as she bites her lip. Cosima can offer such simple compliments, such _commonplace_ compliments; but she utters them with the same conviction with which she plays her music. Her sincerity is unquestionable.

"What was that?"

"That," Delphine ventures, tentatively meeting Cosima's eyes, "is just… something I wrote."

"Yeah, not just," Cosima mutters, glancing down at her rings once again. Delphine wonders what she means—wonders if she should want to know. Suddenly, the brunette shakes her head, jewelry clinking. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to interrupt. Please, keep playing."

"Well, I don't—"

"Seriously, I just came out to set up my pedal board. You won't even know I'm here."

" _Impossible,"_ Delphine wants to tell her. She can feel her presence as much as she can see it. Perhaps that should deter her—logically—but there is a part of her flush with childlike eagerness at the thought of playing in front of Cosima.

It feels tempestuous, in a sense—teasing. Oddly confessional. Cosima kneels down center-stage, setting her board along the bright purple gaffer tape Cal had mapped out earlier, and unloads her pedals. Delphine's fingers still over the keys for a moment. She could play something old and familiar, something easy. Or she could impress.

Her hands decide before her head, tapping fluidly along the keys as they melt seamlessly into a new melody – a song half written. She'd begun working on this one before the start of their tour, right after the new record had been released. She'd been hearing too much In Vitro on the radio, seen too many videos on the internet. The more she was bombarded with their music, the less she felt that it was actually _hers_ , that she had any claim to it. The thrill of creating something uniquely her, something that was more tell than show, had soothed her.

DYAD Records whisked her away before she'd had the time to finish writing, however, so she just plays the same three melodies, over and over. Every few loops she adds some new, exploratory flourish to the phrase. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Cosima faltering with her cords, glancing up over her shoulder with unabashed interest. Delphine can only smile, though her body is still flush with a nervous warmth.

After a few minutes, Cosima seems to have everything plugged in. She sits cross-legged before her rig, and quietly unlatches the guitar case beside her. Delphine's stomach somersaults slightly when she sees Cosima set the guitar in her lap, plugging into the board. She gives a few muted strums, dialing knobs as she tests the pedals. After some tampering, she glances back at Delphine and smiles, giving a thumbs up.

Just as Cosima is about to set her guitar down, Delphine exclaims, "Wait—why don't you play?"

"I was just testing my board," she explains, shaking her head.

"I know, but…" Delphine bites her lip, shuffling from one foot to the other. She feels awkward all of a sudden, like a preteen at a middle school dance. She's used to playing with other people. This shouldn't be a big deal, but she feels as if she is asking a lot. "You could play along, for a bit? I've been stuck on this one for a long time now."

"Oh." Cosima looks utterly surprised for a moment before she sets the guitar strap over her shoulder, running back to turn up the amplifier. "Okay—yeah. Start playing."

"D'accord." Delphine settles into the melody once again, a little bit shakier at first, though the familiarity comforts her. She watches Cosima as she does so. The brunette stares at the floor, unfocused, listening more carefully. After a moment, her left hand begins ghosting over the fret board until a harmony solidifies, and she begins plucking tentatively.

This isn't like In Vitro. It's not just the difference in sound, but the difference in synchronization, too. With the band, everything always seems to revolve around Paul's riffs, around his vocals—a game of follow the leader. Cosima doesn't follow her lead though, doesn't overwhelm her keys. This is syncopation, their instruments playing parallel to each other—a complement, or an embrace.

Delphine's heart pounds all of a sudden. Cosima's strums, her licks, grow a bit bolder as the harmony slots easily into her own. The guitarist steps on one pedal—reverb and delay—plucking a resounding arpeggio before stepping on what Delphine recognizes as the looper. One billowing chord progression is set on repeat as she stomps her chorus and flange, eliciting a mellifluous line that, to Delphine, sounds almost aquatic.

These sudden layers—dulcet nuances—send a thrill coursing through the blonde's body. She thinks of her first piano recital as a child, gazing out from the stage at her parents, her Grand-mère beaming with pride; the first concert she'd attended unsupervised, when she'd stood in line with her best friends for four hours outside of the theater, and drank cheap vodka out of Styrofoam coffee cups; the first time she'd played with Paul, Beth, and Art, when their aspirations were high, but their expectations low—the possibilities endless.

It's been a long time since playing elicited such a visceral response in her. In fact, there's never _been_ a time that her music has sounded like this. Of course, there's never been a time that she's played with Cosima Niehaus before either. None of it seems arbitrary.

She's not sure how long they play; but at some point, the melody shifts, songs bleeding into one another. Cosima never falls behind. Instead, there are moments when Delphine initiates a transition, something the other woman can sense instinctively; moments when she'll glance up from her guitar and stare at Delphine pink-cheeked, mouth slightly gaping, with a look that is equal parts trust and subjection. These are the moments that Delphine feels the most unidentifiably lightheaded, and also the most confident.

Eventually though, Cosima looks at her, and her concentration breaks. Delphine can register, almost distantly, that her eyes have fixed on something over her shoulder. Stumbling slightly over her melody, she glances behind herself, and her hands drop off the keys immediately, feeling her heart jump in embarrassment.

Rachel is watching from the wings, expression indifferent as she stands beside the mousy-haired reporter from _Rolling Stone_ , Madison. The journalist grins at Delphine encouragingly as she catches her eye, waving. They've worked with her on a few occasions before. In fact, she had followed them through half of their tour cycle after the release of the first album, when the hype was just starting to pick up. That had been their first cover story.

"Delphine," Rachel says as she strides forward, her tone customarily clinical. Madison follows unabashedly behind her, regarding the stadium with more curiosity than wonder. "We didn't mean to interrupt."

"No, I'm sorry. I completely lost track of time." She rushes forward to greet Madison, holding out her hand. "Madison—how are you?"

"Formal as ever, huh," Madison asks with a chuckle. Dismissing Delphine's proffered hand, she pulls the drummer into a warm hug instead. "I'm great! So excited to work with you guys again. Is the tour going well?"

"Oh, yes," Delphine sputters, somewhat unbalanced by Madison's gregarious nature. For such a diminutive woman, her personality has always been a bit overwhelming – or at least to Delphine it is. She's not particularly averse to affection, but she doesn't like to feel that it is forced on her either. "Very well."

"Great!" After beaming brightly at the blonde for another moment, Madison looks blatantly over her shoulder, smirking. "You're not going to introduce me, Delphine?"

"Oh, uhm—"

Before she even has the chance to, Madison is rushing past her, thrusting a hand at Cosima. "Cosima Niehaus?"

"Oh, yeah—that's me," Cosima says, taking her hand. She smiles, but Delphine doesn't find it to be entirely genuine. She looks as though she's been pulled abruptly from a daydream, and is struggling to catch up. "Pleasure to meet you—Madison?"

"Yes. Madison Hill, _Rolling Stone_." She shakes Cosima's hand enthusiastically, grasping it firmly between both of hers. To Delphine, it seems she holds the guitarist's hand longer than is necessary – a fact that irks her.

"I was hoping I'd get to meet you, too. Maybe even talk with you. There's been some buzz about Nautilus around the office," she comments, eyes narrowed impishly as she finally releases Cosima's hand.

"Oh, really? That's… cool. Yeah—we can talk if you want to."

"Excellent. Maybe we could set aside a bit of time after your set?" Madison glances between Cosima and Rachel.

"As long as you spend ample amount of time with In Vitro," Rachel comments offhandedly. "The rest is up to Cosima. We don't _represent_ her."

"Well, I would love to talk with you," Cosima answers genially, drawing Madison's attention once again. She smiles more genuinely this time, and the reporter matches her expression eagerly.

"Awesome. Thank you." Suddenly, she turns back to Delphine, a playful smile on her face. "In the meantime though, we really ought to join the rest of the band, Delphine. You, too, Cosima. I want to meet your band members."

"Yes, of course," Delphine answers, pulling the plug from her synthesizer. She catches Cosima's eye in the process, smiling gently at her—almost apologetically. The brunette waves her off, grinning. "Shall we?"

Madison sweeps her arm towards the stage exit, motioning Delphine on before following her. "You know, I actually have a surprise for you today."

"What do you mean?" This strikes the blonde as curious. Madison is an acquaintance, certainly – they've _worked_ together – but there is a personal edge to her suggestion that is somewhat discomfiting.

"Well, I actually brought along a friend today…" With a quick stroll down the corridor, Rachel and Cosima following closely behind, they near In Vitro's spacious rec. room. Before Delphine can reach the door, however, Madison jumps in front of her, throwing a saccharine grin and wink over her shoulder in the process.

Delphine's brow is furrowed as she steps into the room. Madison has already sauntered over to the couch, and sits on the armrest beside a figure deep in conversation with Paul and Art. At their sudden arrival, the man's eyes are drawn to the door, causing the blonde's heart to skip a beat.

"Mark," she asks, jaw slack. Without a single word he rushes forward, grinning from ear to ear, and crushes his lips happily to Delphine's.

She feels dizzy from the sudden affection, but her mouth moves instinctively with his nevertheless, a flush of shame rushing through her. When he pulls away, her mouth is still gaping in dumb surprise. The elation written over his features nearly causes her to lose her breath.

"Surprised," he asks meekly, his voice as kind and delicate as it has always been. He cradles her cheek, thumb stroking lightly beneath her eye. His hand feels impossibly chilly to her. "I missed you." Without allowing her a chance to reply, he pulls her into his arms, burying his face in her hair.

Over his shoulder, Madison is giving her the thumbs up, her expression haughty. And across the room, slinking softly towards Felix, Cosima stares at the floor, lips pursed and eyes wide before she lifts her head, adopting a mask of utter neutrality.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, that ending? Whoops. Told you there would be some less-than-fluffy bits though. It will definitely be addressed in coming chapters. Aside from that, I hope you enjoyed Delphine's POV!


	7. Seven

Since meeting her, Cosima has never felt grateful for Rachel Duncan's aloof presence. Their every exchange thus far seems to have been marked by the manager's flagrant condescension. However, as the woman breezes into the room, nose turning up subtly at Delphine and Mark, the guitarist is unexpectedly thrilled to see her.

"Mr. Rollins," Rachel begins, poised between Mark and Madison. He turns from Delphine's embrace, keeping one arm securely around her waist. Despite the forthright manner with which he'd greeted the drummer, he regards Rachel with a polite sort of timidity. In an odd way, it seems to suit him. Delphine, on the other hand, blushing profusely, has yet to wipe the look of surprise from her face. Nevertheless, she glances at Mark's arm, the way it holds her, and manages to close her mouth. "I wasn't aware you'd be visiting us. Is this business or—" Rachel offers the pair a near-imperceptible smirk. "—pleasure?"

"A bit of both?" He glances warmly at Delphine and smiles. "Madison told me the magazine was printing another article on In Vitro—wanted to know if I'd be up for a freelance job." Cosima has to turn away as Mark's arm squeezes tighter around Delphine's middle. As she does so, she catches Sarah's eye across the room. Her drummer is leant against the wall next to Beth, hands stuffed into the pockets of her leather jacket, her gaze unbearably sympathetic – even a touch angry. Cosima finds she can't look at her either, and instead stares down at her feet. "My schedule was conveniently open this weekend. Couldn't pass up the chance to shoot a couple of great concerts. Especially considering I get to hang out with my girlfriend in the process."

 _Girlfriend._ With the warmth of that greeting kiss, the tenderness of his embrace, the way his arm wraps around her waist in proud possession—their relationship should have been undeniable from the start. Then again, so should have the strictly platonic nature of _her_ relationship with Delphine. Nonetheless, Cosima had somehow allowed herself to imagine—to _believe_ —that she wasn't alone in her affections.

Of all the poor choices, all the misjudgments she's made in her life, she can't easily recall one producing a feeling of foolishness quite as deep as this.

"Well, very sweet," Rachel replies tersely. "I trust you'll take wonderful photographs—you always do. I also trust you'll allow Madison the appropriate time to interview the band."

"I work very efficiently, Ms. Duncan," Madison interjects playfully, glancing over at the rest of the band to roll her eyes. "I'm sure we can allow these two a bit of time together. I know it's been a while since they've seen each other—I had to hear about it for hours on the plane ride over."

"Sorry," Mark chuckles, before turning bashfully to Delphine. She misses a beat before smiling reassuringly at him. Out of the corner of her eye, Cosima watches the blonde hesitate in leaning closer to him, whispering some vague sentiment into his ear.

"I'm sure Maddie can get a few good pull quotes out of the rest of us while they get reacquainted," Beth says, winking in their direction. Cosima chances another glance at the couple, and catches Delphine looking shyly at the floor. Her own cheeks burn with some combination of shame and self-deprecating anger, understanding perfectly well what kind of _reacquainting_ will be in order— _Don't think about it. Don't be any more of a fool._

"Fine," Rachel acquiesces. "We're on a tight schedule." She turns her gaze to Cosima. "You're on in an hour and a half. I suggest you meet with Cal soon for a proper sound-check." Cosima can only nod, throat too tight to form a reply. "Ms. Hill, would you mind speaking with me in the hallway? I've prepared a list of talking points I'd like you to cover with the band." Without waiting for the reporter's agreement, Rachel turns on her heel and strides from the room, not sparing a backwards glance.

" _Talking points_ ," Madison exclaims in a poor imitation of Rachel's posh accent. "Great…" She rolls her eyes before rising, following the manager at a leisurely pace, and pats Mark on the shoulder as she passes. Haughtily, she tells Delphine, "You can thank me later."

As soon as the journalist has left, Cosima sucks in a deep breath, lightly clearing her throat. "Well, should we sound-check?" Felix and Sarah don't need to be asked – they're ready to follow the moment she gives them word, sensing her total discomfort. Art, however—possibly the most neutral person in the room—stops her.

"She said 'soon'. You can hang with us for a bit if you want."

"Yeah," Paul agrees good-naturedly. Cosima has to will herself not to grind her teeth. She's exerting so much energy in simply averting Delphine and Mark's gazes that she feels unsteady. "C'mon. You guys should get to know Mark—one of the best photographers in the business." He shoots the photographer a grin, causing the man to chuckle modestly.

As terrible as she feels in this moment—and truly, the feeling is more potent than she would have imagined—Cosima is still a professional. Mark, despite his relationship with Delphine, is a professional, too. Their circumstances may not be ideal, but they call for a sense of propriety that Cosima is intelligent enough to oblige.

She's not sure if it's her dignity or her compassion that she's swallowing as she walks forward, throat constricting and lips curling dutifully upward as she extends her hand towards the photographer.

"Yeah, s-sorry. Where are my manners," she laughs falsely, barely stumbling over her words. "I tend to get a bit frazzled before shows."

"Nerves like cotton, this one," Sarah laughs. Cosima can tell she's being disingenuous—trying to help _her_ cover. If she weren't so distracted by the weight of Mark's hand, the strange delicateness of it in her own, she might feel more grateful.

"Cosima Niehaus—Nautilus."

"Mark Rollins," he replies, smiling affably. His entire demeanor is welcoming, beckoning them forth with ease. Cosima can't deny the charm in his smile, in the light flutter of his eyes. It pains her, makes her feel somehow betrayed – by whom, she is unsure. "I've heard plenty about you."

"Oh?"

"Yes," he chuckles, releasing her hand. "I think Delphine is your biggest fan." She can't help herself then. She looks at the blonde, feels unable to resist—it's all part of the act, she supposes. But Delphine is suddenly as unreadable to her as she was on the day they met, smiling thinly, though with the faintest tremor in the corner of her mouth.

"Thanks," Cosima says to her, voice quieter, more sincere than she'd meant it to be.

"Of course," Delphine replies, her smile strained. Cosima has to turn away, simply to avoid furrowing her brow, gushing the string of questions that suddenly burbles in her chest.

Felix and Sarah rescue her once again, stealing Mark's attention for a moment with their own introductions, attempted jokes. And while Felix usually has more of a filter in these situations, he is the one who, with Mark's hand in his, innocently remarks, "I didn't know Delphine was seeing anybody."

"Oh, yeah." Mark rubs the back of his neck, pulling his girlfriend closer to him. "Delphine—" He seems to catch himself on this, glancing momentarily at the blonde before correcting himself. "We're pretty private."

"We had a few incidents with the paparazzi after the first album released. We all agreed we ought to tamp down on security after that," Paul explains.

"Except for Childs," Art drawls, earning him a cuff on the arm.

"Some things you just…" Delphine struggles for the right word—Cosima can tell. When her eyes fall expectantly, slightly incredulously on the blonde, the struggle only worsens. Finally, she settles on, "… would rather keep to yourself." It seems a reasonable explanation, Cosima thinks. Personally, she's never been in a relationship where she wanted to keep the other person a secret, but maybe that's just her. Like Sarah said earlier, she's not famous.

"Some things," Mark agrees, nodding at her. Abruptly, he turns to face Cosima and her bandmates again, expression changing quickly. "But, hey—I'm here to photograph In Vitro, of course, but I'd love get some shots of your set, too."

"That'd be great," Sarah says, a bit hurriedly. Cosima can feel her friend's hand on her arm, nudging her towards the door.

"I admit I'm not the _most_ familiar with your music—"

"No worries," Cosima interjects, before adding, with a laugh, "Most of the people in the audience aren't either."

"You get them on their feet though," Beth says.

"Of course we do. We're pretty," Felix smirks.

Mark chuckles. "You'll photograph well, I'm sure."

"Hope so, Mark," Cosima smiles gently, eyes darting to the door.

"I don't want to be the wet blanket," Sarah says, "but maybe we _should_ sound-check? I felt like my drums were off last night. Cal might need to do some experimenting."

"That's a good idea—we should," Felix agrees. Cosima could kiss them both.

"Ever the consummate professionals," Beth says sarcastically. "You choose the most inopportune times to adopt a sense of responsibility, Manning. I've got a fresh bottle of whiskey waiting for us."

"We'll be hitting it later, don't you doubt it."

"Oh, well, I'm sure we'll have time to talk more after your set," Mark tells them. "I'll definitely be in the press pit with my camera though. I'm gonna get some great shots for you guys."

"Thanks," Cosima says. She smiles at both him and Delphine as she walks out, but doesn't meet the blonde's eyes. Once they're out in the hall, striding quickly past Rachel and Madison, who smirks impishly at Cosima as they pass, the guitarist finally feels that she can breathe.

After they've rounded a corner, Felix finally breaks their silence. "Okay, that's… weird, right?"

"Which part," Sarah asks. They're both trailing behind Cosima, walking at a jittery pace.

"Well, the boyfriend, in general? I can understand wanting privacy, but there is a huge difference between a private relationship and a _secret_ one."

"Yeah. Fuckin' weird, that. I may have heard his name tossed around by the band once or twice, but it was never implied that they were dating."

Even though Cosima isn't exactly a part of their conversation, it's obvious that it is entirely for her benefit. "I mean… Cos—"

"Not gonna comment."

"Really—" Felix rushes forward, as if to take her hand, but she quickens her stride.

"What's the point?" When they reach the doors leading up to the stage, Sarah, with more adamant swiftness than Felix, grabs Cosima by the arm and tugs her to a halt.

"You find Cal, yeah," the drummer tells him. He nods, sending his sister a warning glance before leaving them.

Cosima can't meet Sarah's eyes once they're alone. Their earlier conversation plays over in her mind, her friend's caution, her wariness making her feel more like an asshole than a fool. Sarah had seen this coming – maybe not Mark, exactly – but Cosima's dejection, yes.

"Cos," Sarah begins, placing an hand on her shoulder. She tugs slightly on her shirt sleeve in an attempt at getting Cosima to meet her gaze, but the guitarist won't budge. She doesn't push. "About that shit I said earlier…" She doesn't think Sarah is brazen enough to give her an _"I told you so,"_ but she knows she deserves it.

"It's not like you knew, Sarah. Not really."

"No," she sighs, her voice coming quieter. "I just had a feeling that you'd end up getting screwed over somehow. I didn't want to be right about that. I mean—hell, I don't think she meant to… lead you on—"

"She didn't," Cosima says, her voice obstinate. "She didn't lead me on." Finally, she meets Sarah's eyes, her gaze hard, fiery. "She never told me she liked me. She never touched me. She just… enjoyed my company? I don't know—maybe it's been a while since had a friend who wasn't… all caught up in the In Vitro madness. _I don't know._ " Her brow crumples, and she purses her lips tightly. "I read it wrong, Sar—got overenthusiastic. I should've known better. Everyone else did." After a pause, a deep breath, she resolves, "It is what it is."

Sarah watches her for a moment, really studies her, her own brow furrowed. Her grip on Cosima's shoulder tightens.

"I'm sorry, Cos. For the record though—" She hesitates for a moment before conceding. "I do think she likes you."

After a pause, Cosima smiles, though it doesn't touch her eyes. "Fat lot of good that does, huh?"

* * *

Something is off. There are incredible nights for Cosima, when she'll walk out on to the stage, before the lights come up, or the fog starts rolling, when all she has to do is gaze out at the crowd and everything is set aflame.

When it's _on_ , it's like communion – between Nautilus and the audience. Religion might not be in her blood, but spirituality has always been. Her great aunt Gert used to swear their family had descended from a clan of revered mystics. Gert used to drink cactus tea with her breakfast muffins though, too—her reliability questionable.

Now, Cosima at least understands the ideology of speaking with a higher power. When the instrument is in her hands, bright lights on her face and shadows at the backs of a hungry crowd, the discourse unfurls like the tea leaves at the bottom of Gert's cup. Together, they eat the bread, drink the wine. And though she's not one for biblical faith, for the man-upstairs representation, she believes in walking on a divergent plane, remitting otherworldly energies. These are the unseen sciences.

Tonight, they're not on. She feels a disconnect from the crowd, the niggling distraction of Mark and Madison standing in the press pit erecting some sort of barrier between her and the audience. In truth, they don't even seem to notice. The crowd responds to her wildly, but she feels like she's on the mute end of a one-way conversation.

It's frustrating. The tempo of their entire set picks up in her exasperation. Between songs she declines bantering with the crowd, throwing in Sarah and Felix's customary introductions without panache, offering rote thanks to In Vitro for the "awesome opportunity" they've been given. She's scoffing at herself internally for the messes she makes. _At least you didn't quite step on anyone else's toes,_ she tells herself. _You only shot_ yourself _in the foot._

They finish their set too quickly. A part of her wants to walk off stage, pack it in with a quick thank you. The audience wouldn't know any better. Tonight though, they gaze at her with eagerness, an entreaty. Tonight, of all nights, they're not ready for her to go. It infuriates her, in a way. _"I'm not feeling it,"_ she wants to yell at them, resentful of their willing obliviousness. Resenting herself for giving in to an audience that can't even tell the difference. But she can't exactly help herself.

"Oi! Cos," Felix shouts over the din of the crowd. She whips around to squint at him, pulled from her spiteful musings. "Are we done?"

"No," she tells him, voice hard.

Felix kicks the completed set list with the toe of his boot. "So, what's next?" Cosima considers this for a moment. There are newer compositions they could play, but with this strange disconnect, the undeserved fervor of the crowd, it doesn't feel right. Some part of her – some very petulant part – is insisting, _They're not worth it._

Suddenly, she turns between her bandmates and asks, "Old one?"

Sarah perks up immediately. "Which?"

Her choice is immediate. "Anoxia"—the first single Cosima had ever released under the Nautilus moniker, recorded in the basement of her parents' house when she'd been home for winter break during her first year in college. This was back when she'd first gotten into the garage rock scene in San Fran, a time when the constraints of higher education had left her disaffected with her own abilities. She convinced herself, for a brief period, that she could make a name for herself as some greasy, new-age punk playing _bad_ music—ignoring the fact that she was far too sentimental to make a living off of apathy.

"Anoxia," Felix asks, while Sarah, grinning, twirls her sticks. It's more her type of music than anybody else's. "If you say so..."

Cosima turns to face the crowd without comment, switching on her fuzz pedals. "One more," she inquires. They cheer, something that normally makes her heart thump, but today makes her jaw clench. "We're gonna play an old one. Doubt you know it." Readjusting her guitar strap and plucking a fresh pick from the mic stand, she laughs dryly. "Then again, most of you probably didn't know the new stuff either. So… why the fuck not?"

She gives Sarah and Felix a quick signal over her shoulder before stepping over to the nearest amp stack, waving masochistically at Madison as she passes. Without preamble, she thrusts the guitar's pickups into the speaker, smacking her open palm onto the pickguard until the entire stadium erupts with the roar of her feedback. Strumming down hard on a power chord, she jumps back from the amp, feedback washing out gradually. Precisely on her sixteenth down-stroke, Sarah kicks the bass drum, hammering down on the crash cymbals with enough force to make Cosima's entire body shiver.

The album version of "Anoxia" had been a riotous fuzz-fest that dangled perilously between ordered chaos and complete unintelligibility. On the record, it had been about four minutes long; but at the tempo she is playing now, she'll probably be able to compress it into a dizzying three minutes.

She's thrown off kilter by how voraciously the crowd eats it up. "Anoxia" is her song, of course, but it's not _her_ , not Nautilus – or at least it hasn't been in a long time. She feels cheap for feeding it to them; however, as quickly as the negativity hits, it is swept away in the enthusiasm of the crowd, the ascending decibels of her instrument ringing her eardrums in a near painful buzz.

She mounts the chorus and bridge with total self-possession, a cloying fervency that tears violently into the solo. At the same moment her left ring finger is bending the strings up on the fifteenth fret, her right hand strokes forcefully downward. Distantly, she can register the pick slipping from between her fingers, a sudden jolt of heat running through the tendons in her hand, but pays neither of them heed. She closes her eyes tightly, body bowing over the guitar as Cal's instincts kick in and he flips the switch on the strobe lights, her surroundings dissolving.

Moments such as this are the oddest Cosima will ever know. She's always had trouble dialing down the volume in her own mind, smothering the constant chatter of her thoughts. Every once in a while though, if she can play loud enough, hard enough, her hands will move autonomously, the world melting away—the white noise snuffed like a candle's flame. Her hands remember the motions of "Anoxia," but with her eyes closed, the silence swallows her whole. For a moment, it is peaceful.

Until her fingers slide back up the neck of the guitar into the final refrain, head thrown back. When her eyes snap open, she can almost convince herself her ears pop, the music returning with such breathlessness that she feels nauseated.

Cosima's hand is throbbing when she returns to the microphone, a sudden sheen of sweat dappling her neck and cheek, and howls the final chorus with enough force to surprise herself. Even after she and Felix have struck the last notes, Sarah's crash tapering off into the attention of the crowd, the final words of the song carry from her mouth, drifting off into the rafters. For a couple seconds, there is silence, save for the constant, dull hum of the stadium as the lights fade. Then, with sudden excitement, the audience is roaring once again.

Cosima's head rolls back on her neck as she breathes deeply, exhaling through barely parted lips. A tiny bead of sweat trickles down the side of her face, where one of her dreads is pasted to her cheek. When she reaches up to wipe it away, she is met with an even warmer wetness that instantly catches her attention.

There are spots of blood all over her right hand, most of her of her index fingernail torn roughly off. She thinks back to the uncomfortable jolt in her hand after the pick had slipped from her fingers during the solo. The nail must've caught on one of the strings during a hard strum and been ripped from her skin. Cosima laughs, trying to wave the sting out of her finger. She'd been too overwhelmed by the music to even notice.

She removes her guitar – the scuffed '69 Bobkat she's been playing since she was nineteen – and studies the white pickguard, now smudged and dotted with crimson. With a strange sort of reverence, she sets the guitar in its stand, running her bloodied finger across its body.

"Cos—what the hell?" Sarah places a hand on her shoulder, startling her.

"Got a little messy," she replies nonchalantly, waving her bloody hand to the crowd.

"Obviously," Felix says, coming to stand beside them. "You all right?"

"Fine." She smiles for the audience, leaning over to the nearest microphone to thank them for their attentiveness, before they make a hasty exit offstage.

"Nice surprise there, Amadeus," Sarah says, clapping her affectionately on the shoulder. "I've never seen you play it like that before."

Cosima shrugs as Felix takes her right hand in his, cautiously avoiding the blood. "Can't take you anywhere, Darling… we should probably get this cleaned up."

"Probably," she says remotely. Sarah and Felix steer her towards the rec. room. There's a sink in there, a first aid kit. And, as long as Childs hasn't gotten too overzealous over the duration of their set, a fresh bottle of whiskey, too.

"Liquor first, cleanup second, yeah?"

"Yeah," Cosima agrees, perhaps with more conviction than she's been able to muster this entire evening.

When they walk into the rec. room, Delphine is sitting on the couch with Beth, drinking a glass of red wine and speaking quietly, their heads bowed towards each other. They look up immediately as they enter, Delphine's cheeks pink. Even Beth appears a bit disconcerted.

Cosima must look more of a mess than she had imagined, because Delphine is instantly on her feet, brow furrowed, asking what happened. The fact that Sarah and Felix each have a hand on the guitarist, guiding her with unnecessary protectiveness and (despite earlier comments from Sarah), a fair amount of cossetting, only dramatizes the situation.

"It's not how it looks," Cosima mutters offhandedly, glancing down at her own hand. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Delphine walking nearer before waving her off, presenting her bloodied finger. "Nail tore off during a guitar solo." She hurries quickly out of her bandmates' grasps, hopping up onto the counter next to the sink as Felix goes for the first aid kit and Sarah searches for their drink.

"Seriously," Beth asks, a bit incredulously, inviting herself to walk over and inspect Cosima's hand herself. Delphine hovers behind, a bit closer at Beth's forwardness. "That's like… raw as fuck, Cos," she laughs. "And pretty gross."

"I know."

"Childs—you said there was whiskey," Sarah asks, gathering a stack of Styrofoam coffee cups.

"Oh, yeah, let me grab that quick" Beth replies, grinning, and pats Cosima on the shoulder. "I think you deserve a glass, Rock Star."

For a brief moment, after Beth bolts from the room to grab the whiskey, Delphine steps timidly forward. "May I," she asks, glancing down at Cosima's hand.

The brunette squirms slightly. "It's not a big deal. Like, at all," she mutters, but lifts her hand for Delphine's inspection regardless.

After a moment she concedes, "No… it is not so bad. It just looks painful."

"Why haven't you washed it yet," Felix asks, his tone mildly reproachful as he sets down a bandage and a tube of Neosporin beside Cosima.

"They had to see it first," she shrugs, Felix shooting Delphine an accusatory glance as she does so.

"I'm sorry," Delphine tells her, blushing. "You really should clean it."

"A bit of Old Granddad will do the trick," Beth exclaims, tearing at the plastic on the bottle's neck as she strolls back in. Cosima smirks, running her hand under the warm tap, wincing slightly as the water hits her throbbing finger.

"Son of a bitch," she mutters. "It really does sting."

"Poor baby," Felix teases, leaning on the countertop beside Cosima.

"Nothing half a bottle of whiskey can't fix." Sarah hands her the first generously filled cup.

"Half a bottle? Maybe if she'd broken an arm," Beth scoffs, taking the next drink.

"Come now, Elizabeth. You don't want us telling that cute little reporter that In Vitro don't know how to _share_ , do you," Felix asks, accepting his own drink.

"Delphine," Sarah asks, prepping the next cup. As far as she can tell, the blonde had been trying not to watch Cosima drying her hands.

"Oh, no, thank you. I have wine."

"Suit yourself." Sarah keeps the last cup for herself, holding it up to the others. "Cheers. Drink up," she commands, eyeing Cosima. She waits until her friend downs her drink before throwing back her own. As she's promptly filling the next round, Mark and Madison walk in.

The effect of their presence is immediate. Delphine flinches, separating from Cosima's proximity with a suddenness that would almost suggest guilt. Cosima, on the other hand, turns towards Sarah, keeping her eyes on the counter as she busies herself with applying the Neosporin.

Mark throws an arm around Delphine's shoulder, kissing her cheek. "Man, you guys were great," he tells them enthusiastically. "I'm know I got some incredible shots of you. Especially during that lost song. You were just… wild, Cosima. And the blood—looked awesome."

"Mark—"

Delphine's rebuke is cut off as Madison brushes carelessly past her, exclaiming, "Let me see!" Without hesitation, she takes Cosima's hand in hers. Delphine watches her rub her thumb over the brunette's hand, and stiffens against Mark. "You were incredible. So uninhibited." Picking up the band aid, she smiles affably. "Want some help?"

"Sure."

"Thirsty," Sarah asks the journalist, refilling their cups.

"Not yet… maybe after an interview?"

"If there's any left," the drummer snorts.

"I have so many questions I want to ask you right now," the reporter tells her, a little bit quieter, her voice still impish.

"Uh—sure." Cosima speaks into her cup, feeling some strange mixture of exhaustion and anxious energy. It makes her limbs burn, ache. She raises her eyes to meet Madison's, but instead catches Delphine's, watching her nervously as Mark's arm hangs lazily over her shoulder. Cosima downs her drink instantly, forcing herself to smile back at the journalist. "After another drink, okay?"

* * *

Standing in the hallway, her head resting against the concrete wall, Cosima can feel the reverberations of In Vitro's encore pulsing through the infrastructure. The hum of the crowd laps distantly, eerily at her bare feet. She looks down, flexing her toes—can't remember when she lost her shoes. She raises the cup to her lips, too, tipping it back, surprised when barely a drop rolls onto her dry lips—can't remember when she finished the whiskey either.

With a sudden panic, she raises a hand to her ear, relieved to feel the joint she'd tucked there earlier. At least she still has that.

Even the wall feels as if it is pushing her away. Everything spins for a brief moment as she rights herself. Some far away part of her brain is aware that she's had too much to drink, that she should have a glass of water, that sickness is probably imminent. But the nearer part, the louder part, reminds her of the weight of a zippo lighter held in her pants pocket, and sets the joint between her lips.

She'd been _mostly_ sober for the interview with Madison. The reporter had originally promised she'd only take twenty minutes of their time. She only needed a few quotes about life on the road with In Vitro—Sarah hadn't been far off the mark there, much to Cosima's displeasure. But then twenty minutes had quickly passed, and the guitarist was aware that the questions were becoming increasingly personal, asking about _her_ aspirations, inspirations, the method to _her_ madness.

" _When you played that last song—"_

" _Anoxia,"_ Cosima had supplied for her.

" _Anoxia—yes. When you were playing, you had the strangest look on your face. Utterly possessed. It was like_ Poltergeist _or something,"_ the journalist laughed. _"Certainly entrancing for an audience member. But what was going through_ your _mind?"_

" _Nothing,"_ she answered without hesitation, a reply that seemed to surprise Madison.

" _So, there was no… deeply philosophical rumination,"_ the reporter chuckled sarcastically.

" _Nope. Just the quiet—the only time it ever is."_

This had piqued her interest. _"Would you like to elaborate?"_

Cosima smiled sweetly. _"No."_

She takes a long hit off her joint, holding the smoke in her lungs long after they start to burn. Sarah and Felix had done a bit of talking, but most of the questions were directed at her. In truth, she'd been more difficult, more terse than usual, though she tried not to be rude. Madison must have viewed it as a challenge. The way she'd smirk at Cosima, eyes narrowed, mouth on the constant verge of a pursing had said as much.

"You don't have much a sense of discretion, do you?" She's too drunk to be startled by that teasing voice. Turning slowly, she raises the joint languidly to her lips, regarding Madison's perpetual grin, the notepad she'd been carrying earlier now replaced by a Styrofoam cup.

"I do. When I care to," Cosima replies before inhaling.

"Hmm." Madison slows, leaning against the wall just a couple feet from Cosima. Her features are clouded now, eyes heavy-lidded from what Cosima can only assume is the remnants of their Old Granddad. Her voice pitches a little lower when she admits, a tilt to her head, "You're _broodier_ than I'd expected."

"That so?"

"Yeah. Not at all what I'd heard." Cosima shrugs. "I'm not complaining though." The reporter licks her lips, glancing down at her cup. "Well, not about your sunny disposition, at least. All the liquor's gone. I'll complain about that."

"Want a hit," Cosima asks, pulling on the joint a third time.

"Yeah." The guitarist holds up the joint, nodding for her to take it. Madison hesitates before tilting her head back and tapping her lips, a brazen smile on her face. Cosima's stomach does not twist – not in the way it so often has recently – but she feels a quick thrum of heat, nonetheless. "Give me yours?"

She has barely had a chance to nod before Madison is grabbing her by the back of the neck, pulling her boldly to her. She blows her smoke into the reporter's open mouth, feeling a thrill as the woman's lips linger, the overly sweet perfume of liquor pervading. Cosima is too dizzy to pull away, aware that it is mostly a trick of the whiskey, the pot; but also, partially, the heady spin of being come on to unabashedly, standing in the proximity of someone who wants her without qualm.

And Madison does. Cosima may have been foolish enough to misread the signals Delphine has been sending her, but she's had her own pesky feelings in the way, muddling her judgment. Here, there is no affection – merely the primal hum of her body, dulled as it might be by the melancholy Mark Rollins had visited upon her. Here, there is no misinterpretation – not in the undeniable smolder of Madison's fluttering eyes, the heat of her hand still holding Cosima by the back of the neck.

This isn't good for her, she's sure. None of it is, but she can't pull away—might even fall over if she tried. The alcohol and her own thoughtless lust immobilize her. She thinks she might regret it later. Right now, she welcomes it.

"I thought you were a professional," she says lowly, her mouth still hovering before Madison's.

The reporter chuckles. " _On_ the record, yes."

Cosima frowns, unable to stop her every thought from verbalizing. "You don't even know me."

"And you don't know me either _._ We're even." The reporter closes the distance between them suddenly, caressing away Cosima's next protest with the flat of her tongue. With the flames of the drink, the drug, all things unrequited coursing through her, the guitarist doesn't resist. "I saw a picture of you," Madison whispers, pulling away suddenly, a licentious glint in her eyes. "That's all it took to want you. Imagine what watching you perform did to me."

"I just… don't really do this sort of thing often," Cosima sputters dumbly, her tongue feeling heavy, cumbersome around her words.

"Like that matters?" Madison chuckles, pushing her back against the wall. The joint falls from between her fingers. "There's no shame in fucking. We're not kids."

Maybe they're not, but that's exactly what it feels like as they stumble clumsily into the nearest bathroom, just barely remembering to kick the door closed behind them. It's sloppy. There's saliva around Cosima's mouth, her neck – sticky and warm. They paw at each other gruffly, fumbling with shirt buttons, barely pushing bra straps off of shoulders. It's all a blur – a thrill –just distant enough that Cosima feels like a voyeur in her own lay. Somehow, her belt comes undone, pants pushed halfway down her thighs. Before she even has time to think, Madison is buried to the knuckle in her, swallowing her moans in a messy kiss.

It's completely tactless. Sweaty, groping, indelicate. She feels like she's fifteen again, hiding in the closet at some silly makeout party, jacked up on Smirnoff and cheap beer, hoping not to be caught. She probably hasn't had sex this bad since she was fifteen—wonders why it is even getting her off.

That is, until Beth Childs' voice is exclaiming laughingly from the doorway—"Dude!"—a soft gasp following closely behind it.

Cosima is too startled to properly cover herself as she turns to face them – Beth and Delphine. Madison, _still_ _inside of her_ , merely buries her face in her neck, laughing in embarrassment.

"Fuck—"

"Sorry—we'll piss elsewhere," Beth sniggers, grabbing Delphine by the arm and pulling her along with her.

Delphine, who's eyes, wide as saucers, don't leave Cosima's until Beth has pushed her into the hallway, the door slamming behind them.

For a moment after they leave, the only sound Cosima can hear is of her own heart pounding thickly in her ears. Her hands tremble, falling from Madison's body. All the reporter can do is laugh, her embarrassment fading into excitement as Cosima's head thumps dully against the wall behind her.

" _Fuck,"_ she hisses again.

Shaking off her chuckles, Madison looks up at her, placing her slick fingers soothingly on Cosima's waist. "C'mon—it's… a little embarrassing. No big deal though, right?"

Cosima's eyes clench painfully shut.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that escalated quickly. 
> 
> Once again, this is also being posted on tumblr at soundreason-truereligion. Thanks for all the feedback thus far! I'm enjoying writing this so much, and your comments are always a joy to read.


	8. Eight

Cosima wakes to the sound of Felix and Sarah's voices, conversing quietly from above, while below the earth sways. Her mind comes to before her eyes open. When they finally do, her surroundings are darkened, blurred—some dreadful combination of her missing glasses and the monstrous throb bouncing between her temples.

With some effort, she rolls onto her back, groaning through the effort, and wipes a hand blearily over her eyes. From this new vantage, she still can't see, the world spinning, but she can take in the crates and cases stacked tediously around her, the bright light streaming past the obscured windows of their van.

"You awake _awake_ now, or do you plan on passing out again?"

She lifts her hand just a hair's breadth away from her face, shielding her eyes from the revolting sunshine, the stream of traffic and cloudless sky gliding behind the windows. Sarah is leaning over the passenger seat, grinning tiredly as Cosima cranes her head back. In the rearview, she can see Felix watching her, hands gripping the wheel lazily.

"Guess so," she murmurs, her tongue feeling ungainly behind her teeth. Her mouth fills with saliva, the sudden insurgence of sourness making her stomach roll. Scrunching her nose, she allows her head to drop to the floor of the van again.

"Uh-uh—none of that shite." Stretching over the armrest, Sarah pushes Cosima up by the shoulders, grunting. "Gave us a hell of a time last night—kept rolling onto your back every fifteen minutes."

"We were afraid you were going to Jimi-Hendrix yourself," Felix chides.

" _Fuck me,"_ Cosima mutters, working with Sarah to push herself off the floor. Admittedly, it's much harder than it ought to be. Her stomach pitches with the effort of keeping her head upright. In addition to whatever horrendous hangover pains she's feeling, there's a tremendous crick in her neck from sleeping on the floor of the van. As soon as she's on her ass, however, back against an amp, Sarah hands her her glasses, which she readily accepts.

"You got plenty of that last night," Felix tells her, voice wry, but also mildly reproachful. Cosima tilts her head over to look at him, glaring. She recalls more than she would have liked. The blackout didn't occur until long after Delphine had walked in on her and Madison. At the thought, her stomach pitches more aggressively, and she presses a fist to her mouth to stem the nausea.

"C'mon," Sarah tells her, tone admonishing. She reaches down to her own feet, retrieving a plastic bag and a bottle of water, and tosses them both at Cosima. "Keep your hurling in the bag. And drink that."

As a precaution, Cosima dips her head into the bag, but the wave of nausea passes. Her head still swims, however. The sound of Madison's laughter, Delphine's gasping, ring tauntingly in tandem with each pulse of her head.

"No aspirin," she asks, voice still shaky.

"I'm gonna watch you drink that entire water bottle before I give you anything more."

"Dude," Cosima fixes her with as incredulous of a look as she can manage, "that's strangely maternal of you."

Sarah scoffs. "I _know_ how much you drank last night. You don't. I'm just trying to keep you alive."

"Still got a show tonight," Felix adds.

"Of course," Cosima grumbles. She hadn't forgotten – performing is simply the last thing on her mind.

"Now get on with it," Sarah nudges her. "The damn convoy wants to stop for lunch in a half an hour."

"Do we have to?" It's not just her stomach she's concerned for. The idea of being in the same room as Delphine and Mark right now, particularly with Madison still around, makes her stomach dip again.

"After spending half the night taking care of your sorry ass? Yeah, we have to." Sarah's expression brooks no argument. Her capacity for sympathy is cut dramatically on an empty stomach.

"I don't suppose your reluctance is entirely the product of your hangover," Felix suggests knowingly. Looking up, Cosima can see him eyeing her again in the rearview. She hesitates, unsure of how much they heard the night prior. It's doubtful that they would chastise her for sleeping with the reporter. On the contrary, they might applaud her. But _she_ already feels guilty.

Satisfied, too, she thinks. Or, at least, she had been – if her patchwork memories serve her correctly. Of course, as she recalls, she'd kept her eyes closed when she'd finally found release. The mischievous journalist _hadn't_ been the person she'd been picturing, either.

"She's not leaving until tomorrow morning," Felix continues, his tone equal measures caution and redolence.

"And neither is _he_ ," Cosima adds, uncapping her water bottle and taking a swig.

Sarah's face hardens with something like spite, or protectiveness. "More the reason to take advantage of the opportunity you've been given."

"Take advantage of _her_ you mean." Cosima practically chokes down the water, her stomach rebelling. Sarah can only shrug.

"The girl is into you. I mean—really. Her approach last night was completely _gauche_. For your sake, I hope that was due to the whiskey," Felix says.

"For my sake?" Cosima laughs sardonically. "I don't need tact. It was just sex—her idea."

"I'm sure it was," Sarah laughs, turning around and kicking her feet on the dash. "There's mutual benefit there."

"Well, what's it matter," she asks, sulkily.

"What's it matter?" Felix actually turns around at that, if only momentarily, his expression incredulous. "Childs told us she and Delphine walked in on you two."

Cosima flinches. "You know about that?"

"Cos— _Beth_ walked in on you two. _Everyone_ knows."

"For shit's sake—"

"Yes, I know—the drummer is aware you have game. Such a travesty." Felix waves her off. "The matter is, after your little incident last night, Delphine walked into the green room sporting the same robotically aloof expression you were wearing the moment you saw the photographer."

She hesitates again, forcing down another hearty gulp of water. "So?"

"So," Sarah asks, turning around in disbelief. "Do we need to spell it out for you?"

"I'm, like, half brain-dead right now. Don't make me hypothesize."

"Delphine's _jealous,"_ Felix loudly sing-songs.

Cosima stops, the water bottle suspended halfway towards her mouth. "Really?" Her tone is doubtful.

"Why the hell is that so hard for you to believe," Sarah asks, mildly irritated.

"Well," Cosima begins, her laugh caught between anxiety and distrust, " _if_ she's jealous, then she would have to have feelings for me. I mean—if only in some small capacity. But, like—" _Mark._ "No. See, that doesn't make sense to me." Her hands begin moving dramatically, as if to quell her nervous thoughts. "I wouldn't have thought the whole _liking me_ thing was out of the realm of possibility, given the vibes she's been sending out, but that was until Mark. Like, _obviously_ she's into guys. _Obviously_ she has a boyfriend—"

" _Obviously_ she could swing both ways," Felix drones, exasperated. "Just look at you—you swing about forty or _fifty_ different ways. You could fall madly, torridly in love with a bloody hamburger if you were hungry enough." Sarah snorts.

"And _obviously,_ " Cosima continues, ignoring them both, "she didn't tell me because we're _friends._ And I—" Suddenly, her entire body flushes with embarrassment. "God, Sarah, it's like you said. I couldn't have been any more obvious. She must have known how I felt. And she's such a… professional—or whatever—she didn't want to jeopardize the tour, or our friendship? I mean, if he hadn't surprised her yesterday, we may never have had to meet him."

"Are you telling us all this, or asking?"

"I _don't_ know. I'm spit-balling. I'm—" Her head pounds. "— _fuck._ My brain is literally about to ooze from my ears in a viscous goo. Work with me." With renewed determination, the van swaying once again, she downs the rest of her water and thrusts her hand towards Sarah. "Aspirin."

"You better finish this bottle, too. Before we make it to the restaurant," Sarah orders, handing her another bottle and a dose of aspirin.

"Fine," Cosima sighs, swallowing her pills.

"Now, listen," Sarah tells her, still leaning over the armrest, voice a little quieter, regretful. "Stop thinking about what I said. Stop thinking about the boyfriend—"

"What's that going to—"

"I said _listen_ , yeah?" Cosima bites her tongue. Sarah might be rough around the edges, but she's rarely this firm. "You could be right—she may have kept this all from you just to protect your feelings—it's a possibility. But I'm not so sure that's the case. There's an opposite side to this argument. Think about it—let's say—yeah—she does like you. Of course she's not going to tell you about Mark. Why? Because she wants you to treat her like she's single. She wants you to hit on her."

Cosima tilts her head to the side. The pessimistic part of her – the part concerned with self-preservation – wants to deny Sarah's case. That kind of thinking can only foster hope, and for the sake of avoiding any more embarrassment, it's best not to dwell on it. Of course, she has to admit, it's perfectly logical. Maudlin she may be, but she's not without a strong sense of logic.

"More plausible, if you ask me," Felix concedes, glancing back at her in the rearview. "I'm not just saying that to appease you," he tells her gently. "I've spoken to Delphine one-on-one. About _you._ And yes, the woman is gorgeous, well-spoken, seems very intelligent— _but_ —I didn't get the sense that she was entirely self-aware." He shrugs. "So, consider that how you will. But what _you_ were suggesting would require an awful lot of conscious emotional decision-making. And personally, I'm not convinced she'd be capable."

Cosima takes a deep breath, drinking another big gulp of water. Her head is spinning again, and not just from the hangover. It would be dangerous for her to believe what they're saying.

"Guys," she sighs, dropping her head to her knees. "I should be breaking myself of this crush."

"Maybe," Sarah tells her gruffly. "But, those vibes you were talking about? You didn't misconstrue them. The girl digs you. I think she's just being a bloody idiot about it."

"Sarah—"

"Just let me. You get to be sad. I get to be pissed. I'm not gonna let her mess with your head just because she's too oblivious to get hers straight."

After a pause, Cosima relents. "Okay, so… what should I do? Mark is still a thing. I'm not going to be her girl on the side."

"No," Sarah tells her. "You're not."

"And I'm not going to vindictively drive them apart, either. That's not right."

"You don't _have_ to," Felix tells her, exasperated again. "Cos, you were just minding your own damn business last night. Granted, that business happened to be between another woman's legs, but _still_ —look what it did. She was beside herself. I'll bet you money she was even giving the photographer the cold shoulder after that."

"Oh." It's probably wrong, but she feels a small thrill at the thought. "So, just… keep on taking care of myself, you're saying?"

"Or, you know—let the reporter do all the work."

She does, because she doesn't have a choice. By the time they're all seated in the restaurant's largest booth, she's feeling so emotionally scattered, so drained from the hangover that she has no effort to exert. Delphine sits under the weight of Mark's arm; and she, shoulder to shoulder with Madison, the woman's hand tracing patterns over her thigh under the table.

"How are you feeling today," the journalist asks, breathing warmly into her ear. Cosima can feel her smile on her skin.

Turning her head close, she tells her, "Not the worst hangover I've ever had."

"A bit of grease ought to help."

Cosima smiles slightly. "Never fails."

Squeezing her thigh, Madison leans in closer, her voice lower. "I could always help take your mind off of it, too. If you want."

Swallowing, Cosima glances down at the tabletop. "Yeah," she tells her, feeling two different sets of eyes watching.

* * *

"I have to… get ready…" Cosima mutters, her words fractured under the attentiveness of Madison's lips, sucking on her pulse-point.

"You sure," the reporter asks her, nipping at the tender flesh. Cosima flinches. With one final, chaste kiss, she sets her hands on the woman's shoulders, and pushes her away gently.

"Yes." Her smile is placating, tired. _She's_ tired, and not in the typical post-coital manner. There is no feeling of repletion, as she's had with past lovers—even the most casual ones. Instead, she feels distended, wearied. The sex was nice the first time, but she's grown more withdrawn with each time since. "I at least have to collect all the shit I left abandoned in the green room before you stole me away."

"You wanna get rid of me." The journalist smiles brazenly.

Cosima laughs to mask her exasperation. "That's not it." _It is_ —but she captures the woman's lips in a final, compulsory kiss, just to prove herself wrong. "Don't you have some… reporting to do?"

"Eh. Not really, if I'm being honest—got enough material for the article last night. Kind of just enjoying myself, at this point." She draws her fingertip over the curve of Cosima's jaw.

"Ahh, well… I'm still, uh, _working_ —"

"Cosima—I know. I'm just giving you a hard time."

"Oh." She chuffs, rotating the rings on her fingers. "Sorry. I'm a little out of it."

"I did a number on you, huh?" Madison pinches her cheeks teasingly. Out of the corner of her eye, she can see movement. With a brief turn of her head, she catches Delphine rounding the corner away from them, hastily diverting her eyes.

"Y-yeah," she says distractedly, turning back. "I haven't been lavished with this level of attention in a while."

Madison raises her eyebrows. "Really?" Cosima shrugs. "I call bullshit on that one, Niehaus. You're _good_ at what you do." The reporter pats her suddenly on the cheek, perking up. "You're right though—you've got work. Go—be a superstar. I'll have more _attention_ to give you later."

Cosima chuckles, looking down at her feet. "All right," she nods. "Yeah." With one last insatiable glance, the journalist turns sharply on her heel and bounces down the hall, leaving Cosima to catch the breath she'd never lost in the first place.

For as much as she'd been looking forward to being alone when she was with Madison, the moment she's out of sight, Cosima is wishing for the company again. With a sigh, a curse muttered under her breath, she walks in the opposite direction, heading toward the green room with her eyes to the floor. As soon as she gathers up her laptop and phone she can begin setting up on stage, maybe even hang with Sarah and Cal, or—

Her mouth goes dry as she steps into the room. Delphine is standing at the counter, her back to her, pouring herself a glass of wine as she enters. Alerted to her presence, Delphine glances over her shoulder, but quickly averts her eyes.

They're not _not_ speaking as far as Cosima knows—why should they be? They're only friends, after all. Delphine has every right to a boyfriend, every right to her much desired privacy. Just as well, Cosima is entitled to a brief fling. The fact that Delphine saw them rutting in a public restroom is embarrassing, but it hadn't broken any rules.

"Hey, Delphine," Cosima greets, forcing herself to sound as normal as possible.

"Hey." Cosima stops at the terseness of the blonde's voice, glancing at her back with a furrowed brow before heading over to the coffee table to retrieve her things.

"You, uhm—" She clears her throat, bending over to shut her laptop. "You all right?"

"Yes." Her tone is clipped, putting Cosima on guard.

Unplugging her charger from the wall and bundling up the cord, she probes, "Are you sure—"

"Why wouldn't I be," Delphine snaps over her shoulder, quickly recomposing herself and turning back to her wine.

"Well, you _would_ be, I'd imagine—" _Because Mark is here,_ she judiciously omits; but concludes, more moderately, "In fact, I'd think you'd be perfectly happy."

"I am," she tells Cosima, lacking the zeal to convince even herself. The blonde takes a long, slow pull from her glass, setting it down on the counter as she archly, coldly remarks, "I would assume the same for you."

Cosima could ask her, _"What do you mean?"_ —she could continue this snippy, thinly-veiled line of conversation until they're both blue in the face. At this point though, she's too tired to engage in the runaround.

Sighing, she drops the charger onto the table next to the laptop. "Do you have something you want to say to me?"

After a pause, Delphine observes, "We're talking now, aren't we?"

"C'mon—don't give me that. You're obviously upset—" Delphine snorts. "Okay. You're obviously _angry._ " After a pause, the other woman's shoulders tensing, Cosima takes a step forward. "Angry with me."

"What reason do I have to be angry with you, Cosima," She asks smartly.

"I _don't know_ , Delphine. That's why I'm asking you. I'm not in the mood for this game."

"And what _are_ you in the mood for," Delphine asks, whipping around suddenly, body taut. Cosima doesn't know how she should respond—what reaction the blonde is expecting to provoke. Diplomatically, she declines one, though the question makes her flush. "I'm not mad at you, Cosima. Really—I'm not. I'm just disappointed."

"What," Cosima barks incredulously, unable to restrain herself. It's exactly the kind of thing her parents would say to her—have said to her—and exactly the last thing she'd like to be reminded of right now. Her own irritation flares. "Why?"

After a pregnant pause, her face hard and unreadable, Delphine says, "I just thought you were here for the music." Cosima's brow furrows immediately, mouth curled into a frown. "Not to play out some shallow rock and roll fantasy."

She feels like she's been punched in the gut. Not because it's true, or because she feels she's been found out – on the contrary, she's entirely unconvinced that even _Delphine_ believes that. The fact that the woman would say it, however, that she would make the insinuation, is such a low blow, Cosima can't help but feel insulted by it.

"Okay—got it." Cosima shakes her head, lips pursed, and brusquely postulates, "You're mad because I fucked Madison." Delphine says nothing, merely squaring her jaw. "Because _I let her fuck me."_

The blonde scoffs, shakes her head. "You think that's all it is?"

"If you don't like the conclusions I'm drawing then maybe you ought to cut the ambiguity. I'm not some delicate flower _._ "

"I can see that." Delphine steps back, returning to her glass, turning away, much to Cosima's ire. "Maybe I'm upset because you have no qualms sitting in a van with me talking about the sanctity of music, about how much it means to you, but then the moment you walk off stage you—you—" She trips over her words in her anger, nearly slamming her glass down on the counter. "—you stumble around with your drugs and liquor, fucking bimbos _._ "

"Interesting choice of words," Cosima guffaws. "Last time I checked, I was at liberty to. I'm not the one in a relationship here."

Delphine visibly flinches. "Just because you can doesn't mean you should."

"And why shouldn't I," Cosima asks, stepping closer—much closer. "I'm an adult. I feel lust. Why shouldn't I act on it?" Delphine looks down at her glass, expression hard, blank. "I _am_ here for the music. And not just on this tour. I'm talking about getting out of bed every morning, putting on a smile, giving a damn about myself—I'm _here_ for the music. Don't you dare suggest that I'm not, because _that_ I take offense to.

"But look around you," she continues, voice lower, though equally commanding. "It's not music 24/7. There's a bunch of other shit that goes on. And what do you expect me to do? Sit around, smoke a joint, listen to records in the back of the fucking van?" She laughs, running her hands through her dreads in frustration. "Wait for some reporter to come around so that I can give testimonials about how _awesome_ In Vitro are?" The question is mostly rhetorical, but part of her—and she's not sure if it's the part looking for a fight or for placation—hopes that Delphine will respond. "That's bullshit, Delphine. What do you want me to do?"

Delphine crosses her arms protectively over her chest and shakes her head. After a moment, she quietly replies, "I don't know. I just didn't think you were the type of person who would have any interest in… whatever it is you're doing."

The way she says it—Cosima is sure she hadn't meant to be so patronizing, but that's how she takes it. Because after all is said and done, Cosima will be alone with her thoughts tonight. Delphine, on the other hand, will have a fond ear to whisper hers to in the dark. The intimacy is afforded to her.

" _Whatever it is_ , huh?" She steps back, shaking her head. "You know, it's really nice to have someone look at you the way Mark looks at you. I would never begrudge you for having that. The thing is though—I don't. I don't have it." She throws her hands up, pangs of sadness twisting her stomach. "But last night… she just liked me, okay? She was pretty, and nice, and bold. I'm not a bad person for wanting that, if only temporarily. Don't pretend that I am."

Cosima stares at Delphine for a few tense moments, her body tightly coiled. _Look at me,_ she thinks. _Please_ ; but the blonde merely stares into her glass, brow furrowed. The guitarist feels shamed by her own vulnerability, and subsequently vexed by her shame.

"So, that's it?" Delphine turns to glance at the wall, her own shame present, and Cosima can feel the hot sting of tears threatening behind her eyes. _Focus on the anger,_ she tells herself, willing them away. "Cool. Well, enjoy your goddamn high horse."

Cosima immediately turns, storming from the room, her things forgotten. Before she walks out the door, however, she glances over her shoulder one last time. "For the record, just because you're not out sleeping with strangers, that doesn't mean you're not playing at some fucking fantasy."

* * *

It is the shutter of the camera that rouses Delphine back into awareness.

"I'm sorry," Mark tells her from across the room, smiling sheepishly behind the viewfinder. He snaps another photograph as Delphine blearily opens her eyes, hair tousled around her. She tugs the rumpled white sheet more securely over her naked body. "I didn't mean to wake you."

 _I wasn't sleeping,_ she thinks detachedly, though saying so would destroy the pretense she's worked half the night to construct.

"It's okay," she tells him, voice raspy. Though she hasn't slept, her mind has remained in a state of half-consciousness, teetering between total, panicked awareness and cold vacancy for the past few hours. The restlessness has wearied her enough that she sounds as exhausted as she feels.

In the face of her disingenuousness, Mark smiles with complete sincerity. "Good." He walks slowly nearer, unashamed of his nudity in the murkiness of the hotel room. Outside, the sun has started to rise, skirting the edges of the drawn curtains with balmy light. "I just wanted to get a few more shots of you."

With a playful smile, he raises the camera's viewfinder to his eye again, stoking a sense of irritation that, though sudden, has slept beside Delphine all night, warming her body indecently.

"Don't," she groans, rolling onto her side, hands over her face. The shutter clicks—rapid-fire—three times.

"But I need to," Mark chuckles.

Her voice is muffled in her pillow. "No, you don't."

"I do," he says, gentler. She shuts her eyes against the bed, feeling his body dip into the mattress beside her as he places the camera on the bedside table. "Because this is my favorite version of you. And in a few hours, I won't have it to wake beside. Not for… I don't know how long. At least another month?"

She breathes into her pillow, expecting to feel the same gravity in Mark's voice bearing down on her chest. Instead, she inhales without weight, the air leaving her lungs just as easily. A sense of panic grips her. _This is not okay,_ she thinks.

He kisses her shoulder once, twice, his hand slipping under the sheet to rest on the warmth of her stomach, now coiled with tension. _I'm not okay._ She rolls over abruptly, beseeching him with her gaze.

"There you are," he says, caressing her cheek. _But he will notice,_ she tells herself, peering into his half lit eyes with imploring severity. She waits several breaths, simply watching him. His mouth opens preemptively, and she thinks, _This is it._

"Delphine," he beams, eyes sparkling with sudden mischief before he dashes towards the bedside table, plucking up his camera again.

"Non." She buries her face in her hands immediately; but after two antagonizing clicks of the camera, grabs him by the wrist and sputters, "Pourquoi voudriez-vous me rappeler comme ça? Quand je ne suis pas bien?" Sometimes he understands her when she slips into her first language, but not when the words gush from her with such urgency.

His brow furrows. "What did you ask?"

She inhales loudly, squeezing his wrist in a forced tenderness that soon roughens.

"Why must you take photos of me first thing in the morning," she asks, the question seeming to appease him.

"I know you don't like it." He turns the camera off, setting it back on the table. "I'm sorry." _You should be_ , is what she is telling herself, but she knows it is not true. Sighing, she shakes her head demurely.

"Non, c'est—it's all right."

Smiling, he strokes her hair. "You're tired." Delphine nods. "Well, I need to shower yet, before Maddie and I head out—" Her stomach clenches again. At the thought of him leaving, or at the mention of the reporter, she is unsure. "—but we've got some time. You can rest more."

"Okay," she says quietly. Mark presses a soft kiss to her brow before walking into the adjoining bathroom, shutting the door behind him. She holds her breath until she hears the water running, and then exhales loudly.

" _Merde."_ Delphine breathes shakily for several moments, counting her own heartbeats until her eyes fall on the camera left on the bedside table. Silently, she sits up, wrapping the bedsheet around her shoulders, and takes the camera into her hands. A frown pulls at her lips as she reviews this morning's photos. If they were of anyone else, she'd think they were beautiful—enshrouded with feathery shadows, the partial sunlight slipping through the window in thin tendrils to frame her body. The juxtaposition of the dark against her pale skin, against the tangled sheets, is striking.

Mark is a talent. She remembers how beautiful his photographs had made her feel when they'd met, nearly two years ago. He'd shot some of In Vitro's first press photos, but had been so enamored with Delphine, with the look of her, that he'd begged her to let him do portraits of her alone. She'd been shyer then, unused to the individual attention, but had acquiesced to his earnestness.

There had seemed to be such an incredible sense of intimacy in that first session—the way he'd posed her, his hands teasing errant locks of hair, tilting her head in centimeters, canting her shoulders by thin degrees. The movement of his hands and eyes behind the camera's lens, the way he'd entreat— _"May I? Is this okay?"_ —had all seemed so delicate. He'd denuded her with the flash of a bulb, with the angle of his vision; peeled away the well-crafted stratums of her reserve. At the time, she'd assumed that was what it meant to connect with another person emotionally, romantically—she really hadn't before.

The fame had hit then with such suddenness that she'd been completely overwhelmed. She was beautiful – used to a level of objectification – but also bashful, caring little for anything but her passions. She wasn't accustomed to people wanting to _know_ her. It all seemed so insincere, so uncomfortable.

Mark was security. He didn't want her for her fame—had loved her before it had arrived. Their relationship presented a needed constant, a source of normalcy amongst the madness of rock stardom. His photos still made her feel beautiful, even after the debut was released. She'd still been taken with it.

It's difficult to pinpoint now when that original intimacy had disengaged, when the flashbulb, the posturing made her feel more like a concept than a woman. The nudeness of the camera became cold; his idea of how she ought to be represented digging chasms into who she wanted to be. Delphine didn't care for herself on the cover of a magazine. She didn't care to be anyone's project, subject, or model.

That was months ago. She'd asked him to put down the camera, and often he did, but he couldn't understand. They could only exist now without a lens between them. Only in a hotel, each of them in transit, constantly moving away from each other—reconvening briefly in these too-clean, identical rooms.

Celebrity had dashed her point of reference for what a relationship ought to be. For a long time, it had seemed okay to simply draw the curtains, to drop the deadbolt and remove clothes and pretend that neither of them would be going away. But they always did. It was inevitable. And it was not all right.

These mornings—the daybreak she is living in now—had once been painful. To close her eyes against a lover's departure, breathing away each minute in the darkness until one of them would have to rise. Until one of them would turn on the bedside lamp, wick away the sweat of each other in the sink with stiff, perfumed soaps, and dress for a life in which they could not touch. It was smothering.

But the pain is over now. Delphine sets the camera back on the table, slipping under the covers, succumbing to the routine with ease.

In the dark, she peers at the bathroom door with her heart fluttering in her chest, a sense of alarming secrecy lodged in the back of her throat. _Just say it,_ she tells herself. _Just say it once._ _Make it real._

"Je ne suis pas dans l'amour avec toi." She whispers it into the empty room, into the half-light and shadows. Into the closed door; the leftover presences of Mark's warmth, his scent tangled in the sheets. She whispers it and her heart slows, silencing in contentment.

She lets him pass her by not two hours later, still saying _"See you soon,"_ instead of _"Goodbye."_ —scared of breaking _his_ heart, but unafraid of what radiating thing writhes inside of hers, even though there is a hurt that remains. It is not a hurt for the one who leaves, but for the one who stays, the one who will not look her in the eye.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope the all the confrontation and introspection in this chapter clears up some of your concerns/questions after the last two. Delphine seems to have muddled through some of her own confusion, but she's got work to do.


	9. Nine

Someday, Delphine will smoke herself to death. And when she does, it will be the fault of Remi Altier.

It has been years since she has thought of him – a decade, nearly – and she cannot remember the color of his eyes or the curve of his smile, regardless of how many nights she'd spent fantasizing about these things when she was fifteen. For all that she recalls, his could be the face of the security guard that passes her outside of the arena. It could be any one of the countless faces that peer over the audience barricade each night, features obfuscated in the dark. It could even belong to the man who left her for the airport the morning prior, holding her in their final moments with what felt like clinging desperation.

Maybe she's projecting. Delphine holds her cigarette between thumb and forefinger with the same sort of ambiguity that Cosima holds her joints, and inhales as if starved for oxygen. She never would have begged her best friend Adele's older brother to buy her that first pack of cigarettes if Remi had only loved her back.

Delphine supposes people can fall in love when they are fifteen— _truly_ , the kind of love that serves as the foundation for marriages, for families. She supposes people can, in fact, fall in love when they are twelve-years-old, seven-years-old. She thought she had, at the time, but the idea seems laughable now.

Because now Delphine is twenty-five, and though the list of lovers she's taken is short, she can't for the life of her remember if Remi's eyes had been blue or green. She is twenty-five, and though her affections for Remi have long since faded, her craving for nicotine has not.

It is, as a matter of fact—she compulsively checks her phone, which she has been doing every ten minutes for the past day and a half, stomach twisting with anxiety every time the screen lights—12:39 in the morning, and she's cutting into her third pack in less than 48 hours. She can't remember ever smoking so heavily in her life. Not when the second boy broke her heart, not when her parents divorced. Not even during any of the days that have followed Mark's many departures from her life. She smokes now though, with conviction, with a sense of desolation, because it is 12:39, and it has been roughly 56 hours since Cosima has spoken to her.

She's even starting to get a pretty good idea of _why_ that matters the way it does—why she's been keeping track so meticulously. _Progress_ , she tells herself, though she is still at a loss as to how to approach this situation, how to approach Cosima. Taking another long drag from her cigarette, Delphine thinks, sardonically, that it is all _somehow_ the fault of the faceless Remi Altier.

Well, not faceless. Amorphous, perhaps. Generic. That had been why she'd loved him, hadn't it—like all the other girls in her class? She'd loved Remi and so many boys like him over the years because his represented the face of what every girl was _supposed_ to desire. He _probably_ had blue eyes and blonde hair; a clean, symmetrical smile and angular face. He was _probably_ tall and broad-shouldered, a talented footballer with nice clothes and an easy laugh.

Brow furrowing, Delphine wonders exactly how many times in her life she's desired someone simply for the expectation of it, because she was told she should. How many times has she imposed someone else's perception of romance—a pretty rendering from a book or movie—on an imperfect candidate, simply because the exterior aligned with the concept?

She refuses to believe that has been the case with Mark. He was never anyone's perfect example of what a man should be. Handsome, but not classically so. Attentive, but typically unassertive. Principled, but demure. His strength has always lain behind the viewfinder of a camera. That is what Delphine fell for—his sensibility, his kindness and proclivity for art. She fell in love from the inside out.

Stubbing her cigarette on the side of the building, Delphine thinks maybe she ought to have started in a little deeper though—began at some point so ensconced in him that she would have been unable to sift through all of his layers. People are labyrinths—that is what her grand-mère used to say. Not in their confusion, or their capacity for deception; but in the multiplicities of their conviction. To love someone is to wander inside of them. With Mark, she's already found the exit.

Delphine scrubs her hands tiredly over her eyes, unsure of where to go. There's a good chance her tour-mates will be drinking and laughing in both the van and backstage, and her tolerance for either is exceedingly low. Out of habit, and sheer turmoil, she pulls the carton of cigarettes back out of her pocket, and lights up another. With a sigh, she slides down to the pavement and closes her eyes.

"Delphine." She nearly jumps out of her skin at the sound of Beth's voice. "There you are—I've been looking for you." Delphine hums, pursing her lips around the cigarette. Beth sits down beside her, wearing an oddly dour smile. "You've been out here chain-smoking this whole time?"

"Not the whole time," Delphine answers honestly. She'd wandered around the halls of the stadium for several minutes following the concert, hoping to run into Cosima.

"You sneak away as soon as we stepped off stage or something?"

"I suppose," Delphine shrugs. "I wanted some time to myself."

"Oh." Beth picks at a piece of loose gravel and studies it with unnecessary focus. Eyebrow quirking, Delphine goes quiet in anticipation. As flippant as Beth can sometimes be, she can just as easily vacillate into states of contemplation, sullenness—sometimes without apparent reason.

"Are you all right?"

"Me?" Beth looks up, eyes wide, almost pitying. " _I'm_ fine. I just… well, we've got to talk."

"Should I be worried," Delphine asks innocently, her pulse quickening.

" _Worried_ isn't the word I'd use," Beth says, voice tinged with austerity, almost in the way of a parent or older sibling. After a pause, the blonde waiting for her to continue, she says, "You fought with Cosima."

Delphine's mouth goes inexplicably dry. She drags on the cigarette, as a means of distraction. "I did."

"You wanna tell me about that?" Delphine hesitates, staring off at the cars parked about the lot. "Or, you know, I could always go back to Sarah and badger her for the full account." The blonde snorts. "All right then…"

"It shouldn't have happened."

"I gathered that."

"But I couldn't help myself either," Delphine concedes, biting her lip.

"Okay…" Beth peers at Delphine, imploring the woman to meet her eyes. When she staunchly avoids them, the bassist sucks in an audible breath, shaking her head. "Look," she begins, and Delphine knows that she's in for it—that particular tone of voice is never followed by anything less than brash honesty, "I just have to be straight with you. And this is _my_ opinion, so if it's way off the mark feel free to correct me, okay?" Finally, Delphine meets her gaze, nodding shyly.

"All right, well—I've noticed, since this tour began, you and Niehaus—you're pretty close. Which kind of surprised me, since you guys didn't even know each other before this. But, the two of you… you just really seem to connect. And, I mean, when you guys are in the same room, it's like neither of you can keep your distance…"

Beth allows the statement to hang awkwardly between them, piquing Delphine's nerves. "You noticed that," she says dryly, egging her on.

"Kind of hard not to. And, I'd thought, before—" Beth hesitates for a moment, face scrunching thoughtfully. "—I mean, it's pretty much confirmed for me at this point—Cosima must like you."

It's strange to hear it said aloud. Up to this point, Delphine hadn't really dared to think in such terms. A feeling of _like_ seems altogether too broad, too shallow to apply to what is happening. The way Cosima grins at her, speaks to her with such trust and sincerity; the way she matches her, note for note, when they play music together—none of that is _like._ What Cosima is to her feels so much more intrinsic than that. Perhaps it's foolish, but she's presumed that Cosima has been—not quite feeling—but experiencing the exact same thing as her. Something they are both inherent to.

 _A relationship_ , she realizes, blushing profusely, her heart pounding. It's exactly what she's been describing in her head for days, without ever allowing herself to put a word to it. Had she really been that negligent, or had some part of her, unconsciously, been trying to protect herself?

Beth, unaware of the conflict playing out before her, or otherwise choosing to ignore it, continues on. "Del, if I'm being _really_ honest _,_ the way you light up when she smiles at you—I mean, now that I think about—" She seems troubled over her next words, more cautious. Her voice quiets instinctively. "—that's the exact opposite of what played over your face when you saw Mark the other day."

Delphine had known that, too. She'd known it all – or maybe she only _should have_. The bond between her and Cosima, the disconnect between her and her _actual_ lover—she'd known exactly what that meant, even if she hadn't felt it necessary to label it. And now Beth Childs, her bandmate, her _friend,_ is sitting beside her, looking at her with sympathy, saying it all out loud, and she feels utterly indignant. Foolish and cowardly; but above all else, petulant.

"What does it matter to you," she snaps, flicking her cigarette onto the asphalt.

"Hey—" Beth grabs her bicep, affectionately but firmly. The blonde's face burns with how flushed she is. "Am I wrong?"

"You—" It's silly, childish, but Delphine can't help the way her voice suddenly cracks, tears brimming. She shakes her head against them, but her vision swims regardless.

"C'mon, Del… Delphine." She's grateful then that Beth isn't the type to hug, because her dignity couldn't bear it. Instead, the bassist continues clutching her arm with both hands, holding on just a bit tighter, and gently says, "I'm sorry."

"No," Delphine shakes her head more fiercely, voice muffled as she buries her face in her knees. "Don't apologize."

"I shouldn't have been so—"

"Honest?" Delphine looks up at her, finally, wiping the tears messily from her eyes with the back of her hand. "You were just—" She clears her throat. "—making an observation."

"Maybe," Beth says, shame in her voice.

"I think you're right," Delphine admits, voice wavering again. She bites her lip to keep it from trembling. "About all of it."

"You _think_?"

"Well, it's… it's—" Delphine can only laugh, bitterly, wiping away fresh tears. "It might be absurd. I thought I was happy—with Mark. It worked. And then… what? This woman— _woman_ , Beth—I've never even entertained the thought of being with a woman before. She comes along and all of a sudden… I just feel like I'm faking it. Like I've _been_ faking it. How is that?" After a pause, running her hands exasperatedly through her curls, she says, "I wouldn't even know what to do."

Beth pauses for a moment, staring off into the parking lot, before quietly saying, a hint of amusement in her voice, "You say that, but I think you'd be surprised."

"It doesn't make sense."

"Why not," Beth asks suddenly, her eyes intense. "Because it's new—different?"

"Yes."

"Because she's a woman?" Delphine doesn't reply, opting instead to stare down at her feet. "Why should that matter, if she makes you feel happy?"

Delphine inhales shakily. "I don't know."

Beth pauses for a long moment before groaning. "Shit, Cormier. You're gonna owe me a drink for this, all right?" The blonde looks at her curiously. "When I was in college… I was kind of in love with my roommate."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, my roommate. Who was a girl."

"Oh."

"Uh huh." She chuckles suddenly, shaking her head. "And not just any girl. I mean, I think with Cosima you have the benefit of all these common interests. But _this_ girl… she was so different from me. Theatre Major, mother-hen, neat-freak. White wine drinker." She cringes before staring back into the parking lot, gaze elsewhere. "But she took care of me, always listened." She pauses, leaning back against the wall with a sigh. "She had a good heart. And I _liked_ how neurotic she was. It was… strangely comforting."

"What was her name?"

"Alison," she says wistfully, not meeting Delphine's eyes.

"Did she feel the same?"

"That's a tough one to answer." Beth chuckles again, a little bit lonelier. "She'd been dating the same guy since she was sixteen. He came to university with her. They were like… your typical cookie-cutter couple, you know? _Yuppies._ Together, at least—which was maybe why she liked me, liked herself _with_ me. I represented something entirely different. A different kind of life." The bassist picks up a stone and skips it across the asphalt. "Not that she and I were ever really together. I mean—she never left Donnie—just went behind his back.

"We were sleeping together, for a while," she admits quietly, with a sad smirk. "That was probably the extent of it, for us—our intimacy. Not that I'm devaluing it. There were days we skipped every class, both of us crammed into one those shitty dorm beds—wouldn't leave our room the whole day. It was easy to pretend then, that we wouldn't have to." She runs her hand through her hair, sighing. "Those were great days. I felt safe."

"I'm sorry," Delphine says, because she's smart enough to know how this story ends.

"And then one night—Valentine's Day," she laughs sardonically, rolling her eyes. "How fucking cliché—she gets all gussied up to go out to dinner with him. Almost didn't make it, I remember, because she just looked… _so_ pretty, I couldn't stand it. I wanted her to stay. But she went, out of obligation. And when she came home that night…" Beth swallows, scrunching her nose again. "It was odd, because on one hand, she was crying. She was scared. But on the other, she was ecstatic. Because Donnie had proposed to her. And Donnie had been promised a position at his uncle's company right out of college—six figures, guaranteed—and he took it, for her. She could have everything she'd ever wanted, you know. Which was everything her mother had been telling her to want from the time she was a little girl.

"She was just scared, I guess, because she didn't want to break _my_ heart. I mean, I think she was expecting me to shout that night, or cry. And I _did_ do those things, when I was alone; but not when she was standing in front of me, smiling. I just told her I wanted her to be happy. And that was the truth. I kissed her and said, _'I'm happy for you.'_ " Face somber, she finally chances a look at Delphine, and smiles. "I moved out a few days later. By the end of the semester I was a dropout."

After a moment, studying her friend in the lamplight, she asks, "Do you regret it?"

"Hmm," Beth asks, roused from her own thoughts.

"You say she loved you, too?"

"Yeah, I'm sure."

"Do you regret that you didn't fight for her?"

"I _did_ fight for her," Beth asserts. "When I said I wanted her to be happy, I meant it. If I'd stayed, if I'd tried to lure her into _this_ life… I can't even imagine it—Alison on the road," she rolls her eyes again. "If I had asked her to leave Donnie, if I'd committed to her _right then_ , there's a good chance she would've left with me; but she wouldn't have been happy. She would've done everything in her power to convince me that she was, every day, _because_ she loved me, but… that's not enough, Delphine. She's the type of person that requires stability—a familiar bed, a morning routine. I couldn't give her that.

"The fight came when I walked away—when that stupid, illogical part of my brain was screaming at me to be selfish, to take what _I_ wanted. I fought to let someone else have her, because—okay, the guy is a fucking oaf—but he provides for her, gives her the structure she needs. They've even got a kid now, and she just thinks it's the greatest thing in the world. Nothing could make her happier than that." She pauses, offering Delphine a lopsided smile. "I am _not_ cut out for that."

"I suppose you're not," Delphine agrees. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be," Beth laughs. "It's true. I said it first." Her face softens then, and she nudges the blonde's shoulder. "Our relationship—if you want to call it that—it was doomed from the start. I knew that, but I couldn't question it. Just like I couldn't question the fact that we were total opposites, or that, you know, she was a woman. Maybe it was just because I knew from the beginning there was a time limit on us, on my feeling good; but all the other shit seemed so unimportant. Trivial. I didn't have time to focus on—I don't know—never having been with another woman, or what it meant for me, because I was too busy loving her, you know?"

Delphine nods, a small smile finding her lips. "Yeah."

"That whole time I kept telling myself, _I'll sort this out later._ But I never did. I didn't need to. It just ended up…" Beth laughs. "Not fucking mattering."

"Not at all?"

Beth shakes her head. "No. I was happy with someone. In retrospect—"

"All that mattered."

Beth grins widely, clapping her on the shoulder. "She learns!"

"Shut up," Delphine laughs, shoving her.

"I'm just saying—took me pouring my damn heart out to you to drive that point home."

"You could've given me the abridged version, you know."

Beth stands, wiping the loose gravel from her pants. "Yeah, well—" She holds a hand out to Delphine, and pulls her from the ground. "Moral of the story: don't be with someone if they don't make you happy. It doesn't _have_ to be complicated."

"It doesn't," Delphine asks wryly, her stomach twisting at the thought of telling Mark that.

"Well, you work your way up to it." Dragging Delphine's arm, the bassist steers her towards the building, grinning haughtily as she concludes, "An apology is a good place to start."

"Right, but—"

Beth sighs at Delphine's continued arguments, and slings an arm around her shoulder. "Keep it simple."

 _Simple_ seems particularly ironic given that, in Delphine's opinion, it is exactly what this situation is not. Of course, that could only be in light of present circumstance. When she had been in love with Remi Altier, for instance, at the age of fifteen, there had seemed to be nothing more profound in all her life—which is funny, she thinks, considering the hurt she remembers most from that situation came not from the boy who broke her heart, but from her best friend, Adele.

Adele had loved Remi, too, and like Delphine, had not been chosen as the object of his affections. While she probably should have seen that coming, both of them being bookish and gangly and entirely too nervous to even talk to the boy, it didn't stop her from accusing Adele of trying to steal what she felt belonged to her. It didn't stop her, incidentally, from lashing out in jealousy.

Maybe ten years hadn't made all that much of a difference, after all. She'd had an equal amount of difficulty in swallowing her pride at fifteen, in admitting that she had been wrong. They were young enough then that relationships could be torn and mended with surprising frequency, and still maintain some semblance of strength. Delphine had always told herself that age would make friendship more fickle, more scarce. However, Delphine had told herself a lot of things that she was starting to see as completely wrong. Maybe some of the same teenage tactics still applied.

* * *

Cosima is sitting in the back of the van, restringing her guitar with a joint between her lips when Delphine finds her the next afternoon.

Her head is bowed over the body of her electric guitar, ear to the strings as she twists tuning knobs expertly. Cosima's face is mostly obscured by the loose dreads hanging down over her cheeks, but Delphine can see the way her lips pucker in concentration, one eye squinted as she strains to hear. Her first instinct is to tamp down on the thought, but after consciously catching herself, she allows it to form anyway: _she looks adorable._

Delphine bites her lip as she shuffles nervously to a stop a few feet away from the van. Cosima doesn't raise her head, but she's sure she knows someone is there.

"Cosima—"

"What is it, Delphine." Her voice isn't exactly cold, but there is little feeling in it—something that the blonde is unused to. It unsettles her to hear the guitarist's tone so starved of its usual vivacity.

"I can see that—" She clears her throat, taking another step closer. Finally, Cosima looks up at her, brow knitted as she takes a hit from her joint. "—that you're busy. And I don't want to bother you, but…" Her words fail her for a moment, the eloquent apology she rehearsed in her head half the morning suddenly escaping her.

"What? You're bashful all of a sudden?"

"Yes," Delphine insists, forcing herself to ignore Cosima's tone. _Don't think_ , she tells herself. "Because I can be prideful, and it is difficult for me to admit when I've been wrong. But I was, and I'm really sorry."

Cosima studies her for a moment, squinting into the sunlight, and takes another torturously slow hit from her joint. "For which part?"

"All of it? For getting angry when I didn't have a right to. For shouting at you. For suggesting that you are… shallow, or that you don't care about this tour, or—" She takes a deep breath, feeling genuinely disappointed in herself. "I'm not sure what I was trying to accomplish by attacking you like that. I was just—" Delphine actually has to stop herself from saying _jealous_ —surprised when the word plants itself unbidden on the tip of her tongue. "—a little overwhelmed by all of the surprises." She shuffles awkwardly when Cosima frowns at her. "And that is no excuse, I know. I'm just—now that I've really been thinking about it—and I _have_ —I'm probably as shocked as you are by what came out of my mouth the other day."

Cosima stares at her for another moment, frowning, before shaking her head and twisting the tuning knob again. "I _was_ surprised," she says, voice quiet. "I kind of figured you didn't believe even half of what was coming out of your own mouth, but the fact that you _still_ said it—" She clears her throat, gaze shifting to some indeterminate object in the distance before settling finally on Delphine. "I just really felt like you were trying to hurt me, and I couldn't understand why. I didn't do anything close to deserving that."

"You didn't. It wasn't even about you, really," she lies, immediately laughing at how foolish she sounds. "It was about me not being able to deal with what I was feeling—" Before she can allow Cosima the chance to ask exactly _what_ , she continues on. "It was really shitty of me. And I feel terrible. Because I… I care about you, and I don't want you to be upset over something that wasn't at all your fault."

After a moment pursing her lips, spinning the rings on her fingers, Cosima quietly concedes, "Okay."

"Do you forgive me," Delphine asks, betrayed by the note of hope in her voice.

"Well I—" Cosima shakes her head, sighing. "Yeah, I forgive you. Like, I'm not going to hold it against you. But is that going to stop me from feeling bummed about it? No."

Delphine feels a pang in her chest. This is the true difference between teenage apologies and adult ones—the luxury of forgetting is never afforded to one so readily as it is in youth. At this age, verbal apologies have the tendency to be especially counter-productive—like trying to heal with the same instrument that was used to injure in the first place.

"I don't blame you." Cosima half smiles at that, though the expression lacks mirth. "I made you something though, too." Blushing, Delphine pulls the token from her jacket pocket, handing it to the brunette with a mildly embarrassed shrug. "I thought it might make you feel better."

"A CD?"

Delphine shuffles her feet again, suddenly doubting herself. It had worked with Adele, when she was fifteen. In fact, she'd convinced herself it was an exceedingly personal apology. She thought Cosima might agree, but as the brunette holds the blue jewel case dubiously in her hands, she realizes that it might instead seem equally as silly. "A mix."

Cosima reads the title she'd scrawled across the disc with black Sharpie. " _I am the asshole._ " Suddenly smirking, she looks up at Delphine and quirks an eyebrow. "Well, I'm not going to disagree."

"I wasn't expecting you to."

Cosima sobers, pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose. "You know, I don't think anyone has made a mix for me since high school." Delphine smiles shyly. "So, I _might_ give you brownie points for the gesture—maybe. If it's any good."

"I'll be waiting on your review."

Cosima snorts. "Yeah…" Giving the CD one last, thoughtful glance, she sets it down on one of the crates behind her. "I'll give it a listen soon."

"Okay." They lapse into an uncomfortable silence, Delphine glancing down at her feet while Cosima's hand drums anxiously over the half-strung fret board. Taking a deep breath, Delphine accepts that, right now, to expect any more would be too much. Cosima's forgiveness is tenuous—given, but not yet earned. In time, she'll come to deserve it. For now, the guitarist has a right to her space.

Delphine smiles warmly, though somewhat begrudgingly, and tells her, "I'll let you prepare then. Have a good show tonight, Cosima."

"Thanks," Cosima nods nervously. "You, too."

Delphine leaves her then, forcing herself, against instinct, not to look back. Had she, she may have noticed Cosima watching her leave, her brow furrowed in defeat.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> All of your feedback has been super rad, so I kind of just wanted to give you an extra chapter this week. Seemed fitting since this is sort of a transitory chapter, anyhow. Thanks for reading!


	10. Ten

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you want something to listen to while you read, check out Cosima's mix at 8tracks(dot)com/mackenzieleigh/i-am-the-asshole.

Cosima can't remember the last time she played a show this bad. There are two false starts, one forgotten verse, and three flubs. At first, Felix and Sarah gaze at her with the same concern they had the weekend previous, after Mark had shown up and completely derailed her. Then, however, she'd been able to harness her disappointment into a sense of ardency. She'd disengaged emotionally, but her bandmates, the audience had been perfectly attuned to what she was playing. Her misery had culminated in something electrifying.

The crowd doesn't like her tonight though. The din of their conversation drowns her out, makes her feel inadequate when their attentions completely scatter. Sarah and Felix want to sympathize with her, but their frustration wins out. As far as they can tell, nothing is as wrong as it has been the past few days. She shouldn't be playing this badly – not after Delphine apologized to her – not when her distractions have left her.

After the second false start, during which she blatantly misreads her own handwritten setlist, she looks out at the crowd and says, "Sorry about that." It's the first time she's ever apologized to an audience. Her hands grip her guitar ferociously, simply to keep from quaking; but she realizes, in hindsight, no one had been paying enough attention to care.

"What is up with you," Sarah asks as they're walking through the wings. She and Felix flank Cosima, gazing at her with expectant aggravation.

"Guys, I'm really sorry."

Felix sighs dramatically, running a hand through his hair. "Apologies are for amateurs. Which you are _not._ "

"Which means you leave the soap opera backstage," Sarah continues.

"Wait," Felix lowers his voice, "is this about Delphine again?" Cosima gives herself away when she refuses to meet either of their imploring gazes, instead staring at the floor. "Bloody hell, Cos. What did she do now?"

"Nothing," Cosima mutters. Sarah and Felix each grab her by the arm, grinding her to a halt.

"Bullshit—"

"I will beat her arse—"

"I'm serious," Cosima asserts, voice echoing slightly in the dim corridor. "She apologized."

Sarah and Felix are living proof that nurture often overcomes nature. They may not share any blood, but they strikingly share many of the same mannerisms. The identical looks of incredulity they fix Cosima with, arms crossing over their chests, are utterly uncanny.

"She swallowed her pride—how devastating," Felix drawls sarcastically.

"What's the problem then? Was it, like, one of those backhanded _I'm_ -sorry- _you're_ -the-asshole apologies?"

"No," Cosima murmurs, shrugging. "She definitely knows who the asshole is."

"So, why the shit-show?"

After a long pause, Cosima gazing into the eaves while her bandmates wait intently, she answers, "I have no idea."

Sarah throws her hands in the air while Felix groans. "Sweetheart," he begins, his tone somewhat patronizing, "you know I sympathize with the hetero drama—truly. But I think it might be time for you to chin-up—"

"And get your shit together," Sarah concludes, brows raised.

Not sparing her a glance, Felix shoves his sister, and places a hand on Cosima's shoulder. "An apology is no cause for a meltdown."

"I'm not melting down," Cosima exclaims, exasperated.

"Well—are you sure about that? Because the last time I saw you play so poorly, someone had died."

"Guys, I'm just, like—" Gritting her teeth, Cosima rips off her glasses and rubs furiously at her eyes. "I should be happy, I guess. I'm being dumb."

"About—"

"It doesn't matter." Cosima puts her glasses back on, taking a deep breath. "You're right—both of you. I get one stupid thought in my head and I let it dictate the entire show. I can't be like that."

"You're not, usually," Sarah says, her voice softening.

"I know. It's probably—I should probably get some sleep." She chuckles dryly. Neither Sarah nor Felix seems to believe her entirely, but they don't push the matter either. This night has been just as embarrassing for them as it has been for her.

"Good idea. We've got a long haul tonight. Sarah and I will take care of the driving."

They're truer to their word than Cosima is to hers. She curls up on the carpeted floor space set aside in the back of the van, on top of a makeshift bed of egg-crate foam and blankets, and plugs in her earbuds. On her iPod is an 80-song playlist for instances such as this, when her mind buzzes uncomfortably, body surrendering to lethargy. The music is soft enough that, on better nights, she can slip easily into slumber, the softly plucked guitars undulating in tandem with the natural rocking of the van. Tonight though, her worries keep her awake.

It's exhausting to oscillate between blind conceit and egoistic fragility the way her mind tends to. As a musician, she's constantly torn between desires. Wanting magazines, critics, and peers to notice her, to give her due recognition while instinctively shying from the limelight. Craving validation while boasting self-assuredness. Effacing her own work while returning to it doggedly with a sense of unwavering pride, time and time again.

Nearly her entire life she has been a musician, has been _fascinated_ by musicians. And for almost as long, she has been humbled by her belief that musicians, as a people, are some of the worst she has ever known. She's not an exception to the rule.

It's hard to understand how she feels about herself, sometimes. Even harder than it is to understand how others feel about her.

She wonders if she should be grateful that someone like Delphine Cormier – someone famous, and gorgeous, and talented – considers her a friend. That she thinks about Cosima enough to take offense when her intentions are muddied, when she sleeps with strangers. Maybe that gratitude should be enough to accept what has been said, to forgive without consequence. If that's true, it has nothing to do with how she feels.

Cosima doesn't like to be blamed for wrongs she hasn't committed any more than she likes her integrity to be questioned. She may be self-deprecating and vulnerable and prone to giving too much away, but she has a sense of conviction. She was raised as the type to fight on principle, to hold on to the truth even when it turns grim. To love herself.

That's exactly the problem with Delphine's apology, with her honest guilt. Despite her claims of caring, she's still capable of hurting. And Cosima can't help but feel like, in some small way, she's compromising herself by forgiving and forgetting the actions of someone who she can't be certain is equipped to love her the way she deserves.

Her eyes open, willing these thoughts to evaporate. There's a possibility that she's blowing everything out of proportion, that her crush on Delphine is confusing things. What the blonde had said to her had hurt; but how much of that was due to the fact that she _liked_ her? Delphine, though sometimes ambiguous, has always smiled at her like she was wonderful. Sometimes, she even believed she was wonderful, too. Was she hurt because there was no smile for her that day, no illusion to cling to?

10 songs in and she's farther from sleep than she was when she first laid down. Hitting pause on the playlist, she puts her glasses back on and reaches for her backpack in the darkness.

"I hear movement," Sarah scolds from the passenger seat, not glancing back at her.

"I'm just pulling out my laptop quick," she says tiredly.

"No video games."

"Oh my god," Cosima groans, opening up her Mac. She rifles around in the bag and pulls out the blue jewel case next. "Don't treat me like a goddamn child."

"Just sleep," Sarah grunts, kicking her feet up on the dash. Cosima ignores her, plugging her earbuds into the laptop. Pulling up iTunes, she places the CD in the disk drive.

* * *

She's walking into the rear entrance of the arena, instrument cases in hand, when she catches Delphine smoking a cigarette behind the bus. The blonde has her phone pressed to her ear, back straightened in apparent tension. Even from a distance, Cosima can see that whatever conversation she's having can't be particularly pleasant. She slows to a halt, watching as the woman throws one of her hands frustratedly in the air.

"You're staring," Sarah reminds her, brushing brusquely past her shoulder as she carries in pieces of her kit. Cosima blushes, shifting the weight in her hands.

"Shut up," she mutters, trailing slowly into the entrance. Looking over her shoulder once more, she catches Delphine's eye as she turns, dragging harshly on her cigarette. The blonde stares blankly at her, brow furrowed. Embarrassed, Cosima waves, offering her a soft, crooked smile. It's hard to tell, but from several yards away, Delphine seems to smile in return.

"You're going to get yourself in trouble," Felix hisses suddenly in her ear as he comes up behind her, stealing her attention. Before she has the chance to reply, he's tugging her inside by the collar of her shirt.

Cosima searches for the blonde on her way back to retrieve the rest of her equipment, but doesn't see her. She's wriggling her final crate from the van when she feels a hand lightly touch her elbow.

"Would you like some help?"

She startles, whirling around to face a timidly smiling Delphine. "Hey—yeah, sure." She's been lugging equipment long enough that she can handle it on her own, but the crate is dislodged much easier with some assistance. "Thanks."

"Of course." They set the case on the asphalt, allowing it to sit between them. They both stare awkwardly at their feet for a moment before Delphine asks, "Did you, uhm, get a chance to—"

"Oh! Yeah," Cosima says, the blonde's face lighting at her enthusiasm. "I listened to it last night in the van." Three times, she omits. The second to put her to sleep, the third to wake her up this morning.

"I'm glad. Did you enjoy it?" Delphine chews on her lip, hands slipping nervously into her pockets. A slow grin spreads across Cosima's face.

When she was a teenager, music had seemed the only proper way to communicate with others. Books, too, though not nearly as often. It was difficult to write a song for someone without it seeming like it was about _her_ in some way; but making CDs was a different story. As a teen, she'd spent countless evenings obsessing over the perfect compilations for expressing her thoughts. Rarely had the recipients of these gifts seemed to understand the gravity of what she was trying to convey.

Delphine looks at her now as if the future of their relationship hangs in the balance. Maybe it does, in a way. Cosima can relate to that.

"It was awesome," she beams, picking up one end up the crate and gesturing to Delphine to grab the other. The woman obliges, eagerly glancing at her as they walk towards the arena. "For one thing, there were a bunch of songs I'd never heard before on there, which is cool. Like, I get really excited when I find a new artist I like."

"I was afraid I wouldn't be able to surprise you."

Cosima smirks. "I'm not some underground elitist, you know. Don't tell anybody at _Pitchfork_ that though. They'd have me excommunicated."

Chuckling, Delphine assures her, "Your secret's safe with me. I don't think the _Pitchfork_ people are very fond of us, anyway."

"They're _snobs_." As they walk into the arena, Cal and Sarah are walking towards the exit. Without waiting for an invitation, Cal rushes forward to take the crate from them.

"Thanks, Cal." He gives them a mock salute, smiling lopsidedly.

"That the last of it," Sarah asks, eyeing her and Delphine skeptically.

"Two cases. That's it."

"I can take care of those," Cal offers. Sarah merely rolls her eyes, shoving him lightly.

"I can handle it myself, yeah? That being said, I'm feeling lazy."

"Just what I was expecting." He chuckles, dodging another swat from Sarah as he rushes towards the arena proper to unpack Cosima's equipment.

"Don't think I won't kick you in the arse," she yells, following him. Turning, she walks backwards with her eyes trained on Cosima. "You good," she asks, her gaze flicking towards Delphine.

Cosima blushes, understanding Sarah's true implication. "Go, Sarah," she tells her, plainly exasperated. Begrudgingly, Sarah shrugs and chases after Cal. As soon as they're both out of sight, she turns abruptly to Delphine, making a hasty return to their original topic of conversation. "So—my favorite part—about the mix—"

"Yes," Delphine interjects eagerly, her relief clear. "Sorry."

Cosima waves her off. "I just felt like… I was surprised. Because the music on that CD is all so different from the kind of stuff In Vitro plays." She smirks, noting cheekily, "The contrast is pretty interesting, in and of itself."

Delphine raises her eyebrows. "I sense some sort of insinuation there."

"No," Cosima raises her hands defensively, still grinning. "Just curiosity."

"Curiosity, hmm?" The brunette shrugs coyly, while Delphine measures her with a softly narrowed gaze. "Well, there are plenty of hours left in the afternoon. I suppose I can sate your curiosity—under one condition."

Cosima feels betrayed by the skipping of her heart. Their playfulness knocks her off kilter, and for a moment, her stomach squirms at the ease with which they're falling back into it. They shouldn't be so lighthearted after the words they exchanged on Saturday, the venom that had tipped their slights. Despite her melancholy the night prior, she knows there was some truth to her worrying—she shouldn't forgive so easily.

Her comfort is traitorous though, illogical. Laughing with Delphine is natural. It's the bitterness, the resentment that has felt forced. Regardless of her better judgment, her body begs for the comfort that only forgiveness can provide.

It's with total certainty of her own defeat that she replies, "Just one?"

Without hesitation, Delphine nods. "You have to let me buy you a beer."

* * *

"Would you ladies like a refill?"

"Yes," Cosima confidently answers, flashing the bartender a toothy grin at the same time that Delphine shakes her head, declining.

He glances between them with a quirked eyebrow. "Just the one then?"

"Two," she nods.

"Cosima—"

"She's really not nearly as responsible as she likes to pretend," Cosima whispers conspiratorially to the man, smirking innocently at Delphine out of the corner of her eye.

"All right," he says, shrugging her off with a chuckle as he begins tapping them each a third lager.

"I'm already a little buzzed," Delphine announces, her tone reproachful. "And we both have shows to play later."

" _Later._ That's—" Cosima leans over to glance down at the watch on the blonde's wrist, resting on top of the bar. She scoffs. "—hours from now. Even more for you. We'll be fine. In fact," the bartender slides their glasses towards them, and Cosima side-eyes him mischievously, "maybe we should throw in a shot for good measure."

"No," Delphine swats her arm, chuckling as she nervously shakes her head at the curious bartender.

"What?" Cosima takes a sip of her beer, smirking into the glass. "If I get too goofy you can always buy me dinner. To sober me up."

Delphine rolls her eyes. "I think lunch did the trick just fine." In spite of her protests, she takes a pull from her own drink, licking the foam from her lips in a way that Cosima finds utterly distracting. Delphine glances at her sidelong, smirking. "Keep it up and I'll start to think you mean to take advantage of me."

"Me?" Cosima chuckles. Maybe it's her own buzz talking, but before she can stop herself she says, "People like me are incapable of taking advantage of people like you."

Delphine's brow furrows in curiosity. "Exactly what kind of people are we?"

Cosima debates her own answer for a few moments, taking another slow sip of her beer as she does so. She _knows_ what she meant by that. She could lie, passably, but after their argument on Saturday – the thinly-veiled duplicities – she feels simply too tired for excuses.

Setting her glass back on the bar, she waves her hand demonstratively at the blonde. "You—a talented French musician whose fame is equaled only by her beauty." Delphine actually snorts, though her face noticeably colors. "Me—"

"Whatever self-deprecating thing you're about to say—don't."

"I _was_ going to conclude with _'damn cute,'_ you know."

"Preceded only by a litany of self-effacement, I'm sure." Cosima shrugs, laughing nervously. Delphine's frown is earnest enough to make her feel discomfited. "At first, I really wondered if the self-deprecation was all an act—a gimmick, or something."

"It seems to work for others." Cosima toys with the napkin her last drink had been sitting on.

"All that modesty though—it's totally in conflict with the kind of self-assuredness you have on stage."

Now it's Cosima's turn to scoff, rubbing the heel of her palm into her forehead. "You mean like last night?"

"Last night was a fluke, and you know it," Delphine tells her, voice softer. Out of the corner of her eye, Cosima can see the blonde ducking her head in an attempt to meet her eyes. The guitarist was still hoping that Delphine hadn't even been in the building last night during her performance. "I mean—what happened? What was different about last night?"

"I don't know." Again—another lie. It feels transparent as it leaves her mouth. "Well, I do. I had a lot on my mind."

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"No," Cosima tells her, tone definitive, but still warm. She rests her cheek in her hand, smiling softly at Delphine.

The blonde stares at her, challenging, concerned for a moment before she smiles back, countenance even softer. "Self-possession is what I would call it—the way you perform. It's unlike… well. I just can't imagine another musician getting up on stage and doing what you do, the way you do it."

"I'm not exactly an innovator—"

"That's my opinion, Cosima. You can't argue it."

"Fine." Cosima sighs, taking another, longer sip of her drink. "The thing is…" She wastes too many seconds deliberating how to vocalize what she's thinking.

"What?"

"I'm just not really myself on stage." Setting down her glass, she tilts her head to the side. "Or, I am. Either way, I have two different versions of myself to live with, and neither of them knows how to keep shut up."

"You think I don't know what that like," Delphine asks.

"No," Cosima turns to meet her gaze. "I think you _do._ That's why—" She chuckles mordantly. "—even after the weekend you and I had, I'm sitting here buying you drinks."

Delphine stares down at the bar, suddenly quiet. As a distraction, she says, "If you think I'm letting you pay for these you've got another thing coming, _Amadeus._ " She's just trying to bait her, Cosima knows.

Ignoring her comment entirely, she ducks her head, as well, and softly says, "Don't change the subject." Delphine guiltily looks up at her. "Maybe I'll never _really_ be successful—not the way In Vitro is—because I don't know how to reconcile the things I want, the person I want to be. You know, like, I've got this weird kind of intellectual disjunction, and neither side is submissive. I'm constantly fighting _myself_ over things. It's ridiculous."

She glances at Delphine and smiles. "I'll get a taste of it, I'm sure. One of these days, I'll write this really accessible, _digestible_ album—drop right into the mainstream like it's no big thing, soak up the accolades and all that." She tips her head back, looking up at the ceiling. The way she's talking, she thinks she really ought to be more intoxicated than she is. "But I'll bet you anything then I'll just turn right back around and write some ridiculous, narcissistic experimental thing and turn them all off as quickly as I turned them on. You know? Just ruin myself. Like, compulsively." She downs the dregs of her beer and sets the glass down, her napkin on top of it. "It won't deter me though. I'll just start back up again from scratch."

"And struggle?" Delphine sounds almost indignant as she asks it. Cosima can only nod. "But if you really think that, why don't you just… do something to change it?"

After a moment, she replies, "I don't want to." She gazes at Delphine, leaning in closer. "I don't think there's a way for me to say this without it sounding kind of… arrogant, but, I could _be_ where you are, Delphine. I know how to get there. I just couldn't stay there."

In spite of her sincerity, of the softness with which she speaks, Cosima knows that her bitterness is showing through. Not for Delphine, but for herself. _Why not,_ she thinks. The illusion of her wonder—that she was any sort of thing to be admired—has already broken.

"That is arrogant, you know."

"I do."

Delphine frowns. "I've worked very hard to get where I am."

"I know that, too."

"You think you do, Cosima, but I'm not sure that you understand." Delphine swallows the remaining half of her beer in one gulp, setting it down. "I know exactly what it's like to feel as if you're being torn in two different directions at once, like you have these opposing aspects of yourself to contend with. I didn't want that for myself though. I chose a side, and I stuck with it."

"But that couldn't have been so easy."

"It wasn't. I've worked hard to stay committed."

After a pause, brow furrowed, Cosima gently asks, "Is that why you listen to anything but your own music?"

"I don't own In Vitro," she answers vaguely. "Only partially."

"Then how do you get to be proud of it?" After a pause, staring straight ahead at the shelves of liquor bottles lining the walls, Delphine shrugs. Cosima turns on her stool to face her fully, chin resting in her palm. "What about the song you were playing the other day, when I walked in on you? Are you proud of that?"

"I'm proud that I wrote it," she answers without hesitation. "I'm not proud that no one will ever hear it."

"Why not?"

"Can you imagine a song like that on an In Vitro album?"

Cosima laughs. "You play just fine on your own, you know. You could always record something solo, hit the road. Slum it, like me."

" _Slum it_?"

She shrugs. "The _struggle_."

Delphine fixes her with an odd look then—questioning, anxious. "Is it really so romantic?"

"It's working just fine for me," she says happily, though her optimism doesn't entirely seem to assuage Delphine.

"Really?"

"Well," Cosima tilts her head once again, and smiles lightly. "I'm here, aren't I?"

* * *

It's not until they've left the bar and are sitting quietly in the back of a taxi on their way to the arena that Cosima remembers the phone conversation she'd witnessed earlier. It seems entirely irrelevant at this point, and likely, not at all her business; but she's still feeling a pleasant buzz from the beer—uninhibited by the invasive conversation they'd held so flippantly in the bar.

"You know, I wanted to ask you—" She begins, facing Delphine. The blonde turns from the window and waits expectantly for her to continue. "Earlier today, before you met me at the van—I saw you while you were on the phone."

"Oh," Delphine says, her expression wide and unreadable.

"It didn't seem like you were having a very pleasant conversation."

After a pause, meeting Cosima's gaze directly, the blonde tells her, "I was talking to Mark."

"Oh." Cosima's hands clutch each other tightly in her lap, though she doesn't break Delphine's stare. "Everything okay?"

Delphine turns back to the window, speaking into the glass. "I think we're on a break."

Cosima heart pounds suddenly in her chest, completely bewildered. There are at least a dozen questions she wants to ask, but the only word she can form is an emphatic, _"Oh."_ After a moment, she attempts to blink away her shock. "Do you want to talk about it?"

Cosima watches the blonde's reflection carefully in the glass—her mouth faintly turning up in a sad smile. "No."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahh, could it be they were speaking in metaphor a little bit there at the bar? 
> 
> Also! A thing happened!


	11. Eleven

Delphine hadn't expected how liberating it would feel to see Mark's name lighting up her phone – with text messages, phone calls, voicemails – and to simply ignore them. _I'll get to it later_ , she tells herself, though she knows she's being cruel. Since their argument earlier in the week, however, she's felt unburdened by the lack of obligation. That, too, had been a surprise. It's incredible how something that had been forged in passion, something she had acted upon of her own volition, had over time turned rote. The comfort of routine had masked how compulsory their conversations had become.

She's lain in bed the past few nights thinking of her conversation with Beth, her desires, and Cosima—all of these things without guilt. She can be certain of the polarity that binds her to the guitarist, that spins her in a constant, dizzying orbit; just as she can be sure that the flushing of her body during a particularly raucous peel of the brunette's laughter, one of her cheeky smiles, isn't relative to embarrassment or propriety.

Even in her own bed though, under the cover of darkness, it feels awkward to think of Cosima as an object. It's not something she's done with the men she's been with. Closing her eyes to undress someone without their knowing feels like a violation. Having to look at them afterwards and pretend she hadn't been picturing them like that, hadn't derived any sort of thrill from it, is even worse. Besides, Delphine doesn't know where to begin thinking of another woman like that. She's sure it's not so different, but it's still unfamiliar territory. Her body grows warm enough just thinking of the way Cosima grins, the intensity and conviction of her tone during conversation.

Her mind drifts to their conversation in the bar the other day, how it had unintentionally turned so haughty, so ostentatious. She'd hoped to talk about more pleasant things—anything to distract herself from her dissolving relationship. Music was the last thing on her mind—she'd wanted more flippant conversation.

It was all Cosima _could_ talk about sometimes though. Delphine thought of it as a defense mechanism – a way to repress her nerves, her melancholy. There had been no anxiety during their conversation in the bar though. Instead there had been bitterness, arrogance. Even at the time Delphine had felt like she was doing it on purpose, trying to offend her. Challenge her.

Maybe she should have been affronted, or concerned. Maybe it should have been more off-putting, to see this woman she had so often thought of as _modest_ to reveal herself as just the opposite. She still didn't think of Cosima as deceiving, however, or conceited. _Capable_ of both, yes, but her little display of ego had somehow made her seem more accessible—more relatable.

And in spite of herself, Delphine thinks back on that moment, that minor demonstration of superiority and weariness – the intensity with which Cosima had uttered it – and feels heat in her belly. Shamefully so, because what she realized hours after leaving the bar, when she was side-stage watching Nautilus power through their set with that same intensity, was that Cosima had been performing for her that afternoon, too. She'd been playing without a guitar in hand, displaced from the stage and denuded by the obtrusiveness of confession. For once, she had seemed graceless. Unlike others though, without grace, without pretense or filter or humility, Cosima had become oddly more earnest.

Which is exactly her trouble—exactly what makes _Cosima_ trouble. Both sides have now been revealed, both versions, and the worse bits, somehow, have only served to endear her to Delphine more.

Her phone begins lighting again on the bed beside her, vibrating incessantly against her hip. _"Call from Mark,"_ it alerts her. After ignoring him for half the night, she feels guilty enough to accept.

"Hey." She quietly gets up from her bunk and moves to the front of the bus.

"Delphine." He sounds almost relieved for a moment before frustratedly asking her, "Where have you been? I've been trying to get ahold of you all night."

"I had a show." She knows full well it's a paltry excuse, but that is what she tells him, nevertheless, lying down on one of the couches up front.

"I know you had a show. You haven't been playing for the last ten hours though."

"Sorry."

He sighs, taking a very pregnant pause before asking, his voice small and sadly resentful, "So, is this how it's going to be now?"

She covers her face with her arm, eyes burning suddenly. It's disappointing that things have—so abruptly, to him it must seem—ended up this way. It would probably have been easier to keep on holding to the illusion that things between them were just fine. She doesn't want fine though, she realizes. She wants intensity, passion. Everything that comes with it.

"This is how it's _been_."

"No, it hasn't—"

"You haven't been paying attention," she tells him, her voice cracking. "I told you. This isn't what it used to be, Mark. It's not…" She swallows her tears, her voice growing quiet. "It's not exciting."

He scoffs, though she fears she can hear the tears in his own voice. "Exciting? Delphine… we've been together for two years. We're not _dating._ This is a relationship. This is what you do when you're an adult. You—"

"Don't patronize me. I know what a relationship is."

She listens to him breathe deeply for a few moments before he begins again, his voice calmer, "Sorry. It's just… I don't know. What kind of excitement are you expecting? Grandiose romantic gestures? I thought—surprising you last weekend—I thought that was exciting, sweet. It felt that way to me. I was so, _so_ happy—" He cuts himself off. When he begins again, his tone is far more vulnerable. "Weren't you?"

She bites her lip, eyes clenching shut at the obvious answer. "I was just surprised. There was so much—I had so much going on. I couldn't even—" She doesn't know how to finish.

"Christ," he mutters, sounding like he's been sucker-punched. There are several seconds of silence before he continues, his voice quieter, more detached, "But this is supposed to happen. This is the long term." She can picture him shaking his head incredulously, trying to convince himself. "It's not going to be all… passion and romance and sex forever. At some point you just—" He takes a deep breath. "—settle into a routine, get comfortable. You have to start working at it a little bit—hit the plateau before you can take the next big step—"

"Next big step?" Her voice sounds broken even to herself.

"Look—I know how that must sound now." He laughs bitterly. "Hell, this is just… it's a slump. That's natural, Delphine."

"Is it?"

"Yes," he assures her. "Listen, I was talking to my mom—" She can't stop herself from groaning. " _I was talking my mom_ —about us—about what's going on with you—"

"Mark, I don't think you _know_ what's going on with me."

" _Listen_ —she thinks—and I _agree_ —you're just a little shell-shocked, making the transition from that passionate-early-relationship phase into the comfortable settling-down phase. She said it happened to her, too—"

"Mon dieu—"

"Just because my mother said it, that doesn't mean it's wrong."

Her sadness compounds with her growing frustration. _How can he be so oblivious, even now,_ she wonders. It makes her feel invisible, unimportant.

"It's not wrong because your mother said it," she practically yells, but tamps down on her volume immediately. She continues in a heated whisper. "It's wrong because there _is_ no transition, Mark. We've been in a relationship for almost two years, but how long have we actually been together? Most of that time one of us has been travelling for work. We _never_ moved in together, even when we were home. For how rarely we see each other, the passion never should have faded."

After a long pause, he tells her, "Other people make long distance relationships work all the time. Very fulfilling long distance relationships. Not seeing each other is no excuse."

"But that's the thing—it's exactly your excuse." She takes a moment to wipe the tears roughly from her eyes. Finally, she says, "We're not other people."

The silence on the other line lengthens with the light of the passing highway lamps that stretch across the ceiling of the bus. Turning onto her side, phone still held clumsily to her ear, she glances out the window, watching the tops of trees blur by.

"I feel like—this isn't the kind of thing you can decide over the phone. I _need_ to be able to look you in the eye, Delphine."

"But when are we going to see each other?"

"I don't know."

"Exactly." Her voice softens. "This is how it has to be."

" _Has to be."_ She can hear the scowl in his voice. "On a break?"

Sighing—sad, but oddly weightless, she nods to herself. "Yeah."

There's nothing else to be said, really. Except, for him, one final sentiment.

"I still love you. Just as much as I did this weekend—as much as I did a year or two ago. It hasn't changed for me."

_But it will_ , she thinks, her chest tightening. It will, because their pieces do not correspond. Their lives—feelings, thoughts, desires—do not run parallel. One is always just slightly out of time. He will fall out of love easier than he thinks.

"I just need you to know that," he concludes.

"I do," she assures him, her stomach twisting.

"Okay…"

"Goodnight, Mark." She hangs up immediately.

For several minutes she lies there watching the lights pass outside of the windows, listening to the natural hum of the bus. The couch cushions vibrate subtly against her cheek as they coast down the highway, heading east. Tomorrow they'll begin a two night stay in Chicago for a double at the United Center. She should really return to her bunk, but at this point, she knows she won't sleep. In many ways, she doesn't want to.

She had to take Mark's call eventually. That conversation, too, was inevitable. It still hurts, even though she had been the one to incite it. Perhaps especially so, for that reason.

Wanting to wash the bad taste from her mouth, she thumbs through her phone, reading old texts. She pulls up the last conversation she'd had with Cosima. For the past two days, the woman has been particularly shy, self-conscious.

She'd apologized for the way she'd been in the bar. _"I was a total bummer,"_ she'd said _"Like, completely self-aggrandizing and dour. And… cynical. Didn't I tell you I hated cynicism? God, I can be hypocritical."_ And maybe she could be, despite her typical disposition. But Delphine could see in that moment how nervous she was, how embarrassed. She still believed she'd been challenged in the bar, purposely, but she knew even Cosima had thought it uncharacteristic.

The guitarist had been concerned about her, too—about her and Mark. The few times she'd asked about them, she'd been unable to meet her eyes until Delphine declined speaking about it. Then, with honesty, she'd looked at her and said, _"Well, you_ can _talk to me about it, if you want. If you're feeling bad, or something. I don't want you to feel bad."_

She feels bad now, but she won't tell her that. Instead, she sends Cosima a text that says. _"What are the odds that you're still awake?"_

A half a minute later she responds, _"The odds are in your favor."_ Then, just a few seconds after. _"I'm driving."_

" _You shouldn't be texting then!"_ Still, she smiles as she types it.

" _You're right."_ No sooner has she read the text than Cosima's name flares on the screen. Delphine answers immediately, not caring how uncouth it might seem.

"Hello."

"Hey—heads up—you've just been tasked with keeping me awake. Hope you don't mind."

There is nothing she minds less. They talk for nearly two hours. Not once does either of them bring up the topic of music, though Delphine swears she can hear the mix CD she made playing in the background.

* * *

Staying up all night hadn't been her best idea, but she's convinced herself it was out of her control. By the time she steps offstage after their first night at the United Center, she's reasonably exhausted. Invigorated by the idea of being able to stay put for two days, her tour-mates all seem committed to the idea of hitting the town, finding the nicest, most secluded pub in the city and hunkering down with an open tab until closing time. But it's already half past eleven, and Delphine wants nothing more than to take off her sweaty clothes and curl up in bed and watch television.

If she gave Beth the chance to cajole her, she's sure she'd end up plastered at the nearest bar in an hour's time; so, without giving any indication of her plans, she slips back to her hotel room, sending Beth a text to let her know she'll see her in the morning.

She's just settled into her bed, turning on the TV when her phone buzzes on the bedside table. Fully expecting it to be Mark again, she ignores the message, curling up on her side with the remote in hand. A few minutes later, her phone vibrates again, and she groans.

To her surprise, there are two texts from Cosima. The first says, _"Room 214. We can be boring together."_ Then, five minutes later, _"I've got a smoking room and a full mini bar. I cannot be trusted with this."_ Chuckling to herself, Delphine turns off the TV without thought, and picks up her jeans from the floor, pulling them on with a clean tee shirt and socks. She's about to leave her room, but hesitates. Before she shuts the door, she abandons her phone on the nearest table.

As she's taking the stairs down to Cosima's floor, she wonders if she ought to have freshened up before leaving her room. She'd washed off all of her makeup before settling down in bed, and her hair is more than likely a mess. She'd rather be in Cosima's room _now_ though, instead of taking the time to put on a new face, to make herself up. The thought of looking so utterly… uninteresting around her makes her smile.

Cosima positively beams when she opens the door, a quick look of relief passing over her features. "Hey! I was afraid you may have already fallen asleep or something." She steps aside to allow Delphine into her room. Amazingly, the blonde can see that in the short time Cosima has been here, a small explosion of belongings has already swallowed the floor. The mini bar, too, has been half emptied onto the table, along with her drug paraphernalia. "Want a drink?" Cosima rushes over the table to pick up two bottles of vodka.

"Sure," Delphine shrugs, taking the proffered drink. She and Cosima uncap at the same time, and the guitarist holds out her bottle in a toast.

"To Chicago," she proclaims goofily, clinking her bottle against Delphine's. "And to my own room. And an actual bed. It's the height of luxury."

Delphine laughs, echoing her sentiments. "Yes—to Chicago." They down both of their bottles, wincing against the burn.

"Wow. I always forget how much I hate vodka until I've already swallowed it."

"Me, too," Delphine chuckles. Spying the weed on the table, she walks over to pick up Cosima's bowl, studying the hand-blown glass curiously. "It's an octopus," she realizes, admiring the craftsmanship.

"Yeah, yeah—" Cosima hovers over her shoulder, grinning. "That's my favorite piece."

"You were going to use it—in here?" Delphine's eyebrow rises dubiously at Cosima's eager nod.

"Aside from the fact that they don't really give a shit as long as you're in a smoking room, I've got an airtight method of diffusion—been using it for years."

"Really?"

"Oh, yeah. Totally." Cosima's eyes light suddenly, her grin turning crooked. "Want to try?" Delphine's head tilts to the side, considering. She's twenty-five—too old to be nervous about smoking pot, even if it is illegal—and Cosima's eyes are very bright and eager. Delphine can't shake the memory of that first night they shared in the van, listening to Nat King Cole. The contact-high alone had felt utterly blissful, and Cosima, suffused in a pall of smoke, had been so soft, so open.

"Yes," Delphine nods unequivocally, smiling.

"All right! Cool—" Grinning, Cosima quickly begins packing the bowl. "Would you like to assist?"

"Sure."

"Okay, go start the fan in the bathroom and get a damp towel ready. I'll be right in." Delphine does as she's told, feeling giddy and nervous, the way she always had as a teenager whenever she was about to do something she knew was "against the rules". Her whole life has been dictated by them, she thinks, dampening the towel in the sink; but Cosima's enthusiasm emboldens her.

"Okay—towel, please." Cosima sets the bowl on the counter along with a cardboard toilet paper roll and a lighter. Delphine quirks an eyebrow and hands her the towel, which Cosima promptly pads beneath the closed door. She glances around then, a look of recognition passing over her face when she spots the fan right above the bathtub. "Wanna squeeze in with me," she asks, gesturing towards the tub.

"What," Delphine laughs, already feeling a bit warm from the vodka.

Cosima grabs their paraphernalia and sits in the tub, pulling her knees to her chest. "It'll be easier to vent the smoke if we're right under the fan."

Delphine shrugs, taking a seat opposite her. "That makes sense."

After a moment, Cosima smiles. "All I'm gonna do is take a nice hit, and blow the smoke up towards the ceiling, through this—" She picks up the cardboard roll.

"What is that?"

"Jury-rigged diffuser. It's just a toilet paper roll with dryer sheets stuffed into the end of it."

"So crafty."

"I'm basically a girl scout." Cosima smiles cheekily, setting the pipe between her lips and lighting her first hit. She holds for several moments, passing Delphine the bowl and lighter before blowing her smoke into the toilet paper roll. "You ever hit a bowl before?" Delphine shakes her head a little timidly. "Well, do just like I did—" As Delphine brings the bowl to her lips, Cosima leans forward to gently position her thumb, her hand very warm. "Hold that there while you light it… flame around the rim— _concentric motions_ ," she chuckles, tongue between her teeth. "Now let your thumb off."

Delphine follows her instructions, her lungs filling instantly with a steady burn. Admittedly, she hasn't smoked pot since she was a teenager. She forgot how acutely her chest would smolder, lungs tingling. She tries to hold the smoke for as long as possible, but feels a cough burbling after just a few moments. Cosima holds the toilet paper roll up to her mouth for her.

"There you go," she tells her, rubbing her knee almost proudly. "Cough it out. You'll feel it more."

Feeling it isn't a problem. Within minutes a strange sense of buoyancy begins expanding inside of her chest, the skin of her face syrupy as it sloughs around her burgeoning smile.

After the fourth hit passed back and forth, Cosima takes the bowl from her and says, chuckling, "You're done."

"No," Delphine laughs. "I'm fine."

"You're high."

"I thought that was the point."

"It is," Cosima says, readying her lighter. "I'm not trying to completely waste you though."

Delphine pouts, her expression a bit mischievous. "Is this an order?"

Cosima's eyes narrow, though she smiles, taking another hit. Once she's blown the smoke, she cocks her head. "Someone here has to be responsible."

"That is not exactly the word I would use to describe you, Cosima," she chuckles.

"I'm full of surprises."

Unintentionally, Delphine leans forward, her knees brushing against the other woman's. She suddenly wishes to feel her skin, to run her fingertips over the softness of it. "Are you?"

"Yeah, you'd be surprised." Realizing what she's said, she laughs to herself. "—By how surprising I can be. Wow— _I'm_ stoned. This shit's pretty good."

Burying her face in her knees, her hair falling over Cosima's legs, Delphine laughs to herself. Her hand settles over the other woman's wrist, squeezing, as if to anchor herself. After a moment's hesitation, her mouth going dry, Cosima takes her unoccupied hand and runs it gently through Delphine's curls. The blonde flinches against the unexpected touch for a moment, nearly scaring Cosima off, before she settles back against her.

"That feels good," she mumbles into her lap.

"Everything feels good right now," Cosima quietly tells her. Breathing deeply, she smiles to herself. "I haven't done this in a while, you know. It's nice."

"What's that," Delphine asks, not daring to lift her head.

"Well, pot's just part of my daily routine now. Weed, to me—it's what nicotine is to you. It's kind of nice to, like…" she chuckles, "sit in a bathtub with someone and get legitimately stoned. Like it's still this fun, secret thing to do."

"How long have you bene smoking for," Delphine asks, turning her head to glance up at Cosima.

"Since I was a freshman in high school," she shrugs. "I've lived in San Fran my whole life. We're pretty liberal about this shit out there."

"Hmm. People seem to think we're more open about these things in Europe, too; but I grew up in the suburbs outside of Paris. My parents were very, uhm… conservative. I never really got to experience these sorts of things growing up."

"Really?" Delphine nods, sitting up. Cosima's hand falls reluctantly away. "Conservative is surprising. Given your career."

"I was classically trained," she shrugs. "In piano."

"How did you get into drumming then?"

Delphine blushes. "It's very silly."

"I don't care. I like silly."

Cosima's smile is genuine enough that she answers to it. "I was in a secret rock band in high school, against my parents' wishes."

"Ooh," Cosima teases, waggling her eyebrows. " _Ms._ _Cormier._ "

Delphine slaps her arm, laughing. "That was a big deal for me—rebellion. I was conditioned to follow rules." She sheepishly averts her eyes.

"But you were an undercover badass, too. Obvs."

"Maybe. I fell a little in love with boy in an… uhm, I guess you would say 'indie' band. That's what he called it. He was very proud." She shrugs, "it all sounded like pop to me, but I could never let him hear me say that. His friends needed someone to play keyboards and sing a little bit, so they invited me to join them. I don't think he was very happy about that. He was only their drummer. I came in and they handed me this big, important role. It made him jealous."

"Kinda sounds like a prick."

"He was. But… I was seventeen—what did I know? I got more attention at shows than him. I guess because I was the only girl, and all the guys would flock to me. Our bandmates began placing me center stage. It drove him crazy, I think. So he started… criticizing me. Constantly, when we were alone, which—you know, I was young—it was about so much more than music for me. I loved him. And he would…" Cosima's brow furrows at the way Delphine's face colors, the way she looks away.

"He was the boy I lost my virginity to," she admits. "So, it was especially harsh. I was still so awkward about sex—self-conscious. We'd play a show and then later he would take me home. We would have sex, and as we were lying in bed after, he'd start in on some tirade. _You're such a rigid performer, Delphine. You'll never make it as an artist. You should just stick to that stuffy classical shit._ "

"What an asshole," Cosima interjects, unable to help herself. "I mean—that's such a vulnerable position to put someone in."

"Oui."

"I'm sorry." She lays her hand on Delphine's forearm, her thumb rubbing tiny circles. The blonde's skin suddenly feels so sensitive, so absorbent.

Clearing her throat, she continues. "It was years ago. But it was… hard, at the time. My self-confidence was wounded."

"Understandably." Cosima watches her staring down at her hands for a moment before asking, "How did that lead you to drums?"

Delphine's lips quirk into a shy smirk. "It took me longer than it should have to see him for what he was. But when I did, I had a lot of resentment. He used to act like he was such a talented performer, you know? Like he was such a prodigy. I remember, _after_ we broke up, we got in this big argument—a clash of egos, I guess. And I told him, _'You think what do is so hard, but I bet_ I _could learn to play drums better than you ever could'._ "

Cosima starts laughing, a look of satisfaction on her face. "Oh my god—spite drumming!"

"On principle, I had to prove myself," Delphine explains, smiling. She laughs along with Cosima, feeling, for the first time, very proud of this story.

"Jesus… you sure did. That guy must've shit himself the first time he saw In Vitro on the cover of a magazine," Cosima laughs, her hand squeezing Delphine's arm.

The blonde shrugs. "I kind of hope so, to be honest." Their laughter ricochets off the shower tiles in melodious peels. It sounds so musical, the bright meld of their amusement. Looking down, Delphine realizes Cosima's hand is still gently rubbing her arm, their knees bumping awkwardly in the tub. The rub of their pants generates a pleasant sort of friction that warms her entire body.

"What are you thinking about," Cosima asks. She sounds somehow far away but also very near, making Delphine feel that her presence is only just glancing.

"Everything," she answers. "I am so aware of everything."

Cosima peers at her, eyes pink and half-lidded before she abruptly stands, startling her. "Sorry," she mutters, her fingertips brushing through Delphine's hair before offering her a hand. "C'mon. Stretch your legs. Sitting still all night won't do you any good."

When they leave the bathroom, Cosima immediately opens the window, inviting a chilly gust of air into the room. Delphine shivers, plopping down on the bed unceremoniously. As she does so, she accidentally bumps Cosima's laptop, rousing it from sleep. The photo that wallpapers the screen catches her eye.

"What is this," she asks, pointing as Cosima walks back over.

"Huh—oh, yeah. That's my favorite picture in the world." She sits down next to Delphine, smiling as the blonde studies the black and white photograph. The young man and woman in it both wear loud, mismatched clothing, fringed with beads and feathers. The woman sits on a tree stump, hands between her knees, and gawps at the camera with austere eyes and a bewildered, open-mouthed countenance. The man, tipping his panama hat as he leans against her, smiles charmingly, his mouth lopsided.

Leaning forward, Cosima points at each of them in turn. "That's my pap, and that's his sister, my great aunt Gert. This was taken in… 1966, I think?"

"They were _hippies_ ," Delphine says, her tone amused.

"Oh god. They _eschewed_ hippie culture—called themselves transcendentalists, mystics—what have you. They were living in some weird, pseudo-cultist commune when this was taken, studying eastern religions."

"Like Buddhism?"

"Nah, that was, too, uh… predictable for them. They were—how the hell did Gert phrase is," she asks herself, thinking for a moment before snapping her fingers. " _'Cosmologically concerned Jainists.'_ "

"What does that mean?"

"It means they took a bad Ayahuasca trip and lost about three years of their lives." Cosima chuckles, shaking her head. "They had the most amazing stories though—totally nuts, some of them. I'm skeptical of how much was true. The stuff that came from Gert was especially… dubious. She never really recovered from all the psychedelics."

Delphine wrinkles her nose. "Ayahuasca is…?"

"DMT?" Delphine shakes her head, still unfamiliar. "It's a hallucinogenic chemical, found in plant life, uhm—it's actually the chemical the brain releases in the moments just before death. The thing that causes those out-of-body, light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel visions."

"Really? And you can just… take that stuff? As a drug?"

"Well, yes. But it's pretty heavy-duty. There's this whole process of extracting it from the roots of plants. Then you have to boil it with some other shit—I'm not exactly sure."

"You never did it."

Cosima shakes her head. "No way. It's mostly always been pot for me. Mushrooms a few times. Mescaline once, when I was a freshman in college." She cringes, recalling the experience. "That's another one that's supposedly very spiritual. I was… ' _searching_ ,' at the time."

"And what did you find," Delphine asks wryly, leaning back on her elbows, glancing curiously at the brunette.

"Myself—" She deadpans, leaning back to join her. "—in the back of my friend's '98 Honda, puking my guts out. And then later, in my bed, where I slept for seventeen hours straight." She looks at Delphine, grinning. "Enlightenment… so fickle. Always where you'd least expect to find it."

Smiling wistfully, Delphine glances at the ceiling, her eyes fluttering closed. "I don't think I'm the type of person who can really do drugs," she tells Cosima.

"You shouldn't then. If you know your own limits, it won't do you any good to force them." She pauses for a moment. "There were times when I really pushed myself. It was just scary—I took nothing of value away from it."

"Why push then?" Cosima can only shrug. "Do you smoke pot every day because you're still _searching_?"

The guitarist snorts, considering. "If I'm being honest—I don't know." Her brow knits before she shakes her head. Leaning over Delphine, her body close, she pulls up her iTunes. "It's a compartmentalization thing, I guess," she murmurs.

Delphine is distracted by the nearness of her warmth as she clicks through the laptop. There's a fluttering in her chest as she traces the curvature of Cosima's neck with her gaze, outlining the subtle jut of her collarbones, the protrusion of her bottom lip. So little seems to separate them in this moment.

Cosima smiles at her and she realizes there is music playing—the first song from the mix CD. She smiles back, her face burning.

"You don't mind listening to this, do you?" Delphine shakes her head as the brunette settles back on the bed beside her. She nods along to the music, humming low in her throat for a moment. Delphine's limbs twitch.

Forcing herself to speak, she asks, "What is your favorite track?"

"My favorite—that's easy." Cosima leans back over her, skipping down the playlist to track number twelve, a gentle, lamenting folk song.

"This one?" Delphine swallows, her stomach twisting.

"Yeah—why?"

She shrugs. "Just wondering."

Cosima shrugs, too. Sitting back, she and Delphine both stare at the wall, listening to the song, the lyrics, together. As the refrain hits, Cosima sings along gently, _"I could be somewhere else/I should be somewhere else, but/You wouldn't know me if I was."_

"It's sad," Delphine says suddenly, her voice equally so.

"No," Cosima says, gazing at her uneasily. "I don't think so. I mean—it doesn't have to be."

"Just listen… I don't think I can hear it any other way." Cosima peers into her eyes for a moment, intense. She licks her lips and swallows, shaking her head. Standing up at the foot of the of the bed, she extends her hand.

"C'mon."

"What?" Delphine sits up, but doesn't yet take her hand.

"You want to make a sad song _not_ -sad?" After moment's hesitation, Delphine takes her hand, allowing herself to be pulled to her feet. Immediately, Cosima grasps her hand tightly, the other settling on her waist, and slots easily against her. Leading, she begins to sway lightly. "You just dance with it," she says, not quite a whisper, but a volume meant only for Delphine. "It's that easy."

The blonde, so aware of their height difference, of the agreement of their bodies' dips and curves, of the delicacy with which Cosima holds her—finds it difficult to breathe. She's unsure why, but her eyes suddenly burn. Embarrassed, she presses closer to Cosima, resting her head in her dreads to hide the sudden glimmer in her eyes.

"This song—it's about… not being happy with yourself, right," Cosima asks in that same quiet voice. "And, yeah, that is sad. To feel dissatisfied with who you are. Except, that's not the end of it. Because he's found someone who invalidates all of that. That's not so bad, is it—to say, _imperfect-me with you is better than perfect-me without you._ " She pauses, humming along to the next refrain. "I find that so comforting," she breathes into Delphine's clavicle, and the blonde swears she can hear the exhalation in her chest.

She's not sure when they stopped dancing, but as her arm wraps more tightly around Cosima's shoulders, Delphine realizes they are simply standing in the middle of the floor, holding onto each other. Her heart flutters again. She clenches her eyes, inhaling deeply. "It's not sad," she agrees. "Unless you don't get to have that person, once you find them."

Cosima pulls back just far enough to look her in the eyes, holding their joined hands close to her chest. "Delphine—" she starts, swallowing. "You don't seem okay." Maybe she meant it as a question, but it comes across more as a statement. Delphine just barely shakes her head. "It's okay." She squeezes her hand tighter, hesitation in her eyes. "Can I ask you something?"

After a moment, heart pounding, Delphine nods. "Yes."

"You don't need to explain, just— _yes_ or _no._ " She bites her lip, mouth opening falsely once before her tongue and teeth catch up, forming the words. "Whatever's going on between you and Mark right now—does it have anything to do with me?"

Delphine's mouth is so dry she can't trust it to form words. Cosima's gaze; the accuracy, the honesty of her question—they're all so arresting she almost feels unable to move.

Somehow, shocking even herself, she replies, "Yes." They are on this break because Delphine is no longer in love with him—a natural separation. It's about _them_ , but she would not have realized that if she didn't have something else to compare it to, such as the way she feels right now—the pounding in her chest, severed from fear; the heat and security of their bodies pressed together; the sense of arrival she feels at this juncture.

"I'm sorry," Cosima says, her gaze unwavering. Then, after a moment's pause, "But I'm not."

The room dissolves. Delphine isn't thinking when it happens—for once. There's just this lateral gravity pushing her forward, her mouth meeting Cosima's breathlessly. It's sensational and new, but oddly familiar, like returning to one of the many rooms of her childhood—the furniture untouched, yet immaculately cared for. The shape of it has been waiting for her—the parting of her lips, her hand rising from Cosima's shoulder to grasp the back of her neck.

She was right—what she said to Beth—to think this would be different. It _is._ Because it fits.

And Cosima—soft, pliant—melting into her—is responding. Her hand squeezes Delphine's hip, the other rising to cup her cheek. She unfurls for Delphine, whimpering into her mouth. The sound ignites something primal in the blonde. Unable to help herself, she presses forward, leaning to deepen their kiss.

That is when, holding Delphine's face in her hands, Cosima pulls away, taking a ragged breath. "Wait," she says, her voice cracking. "Wait."

"What is it?" Delphine leans forward, kissing the corner of her mouth, but Cosima ducks out of her reach.

" _No,_ " she tells her. "Delphine—you're stoned."

"I know what I'm doing," she insists, resting her forehead against Cosima's.

" _Now_ you do. But now you're high. And you're—" Delphine can feel her tensing. "—on a _break_."

"I want this." She can feel her own voice quavering, unable to ignore the truth of it.

Cosima clenches her eyes shut, shaking her head. "Use your actions, not your words."

"That's what I'm doing," Delphine insists, her voice quiet, frustrated.

Cosima pulls back again, still holding her by her shoulders. "Except that your boyfriend thinks that _this_ —this thing you want—is just a phase." She swallows before continuing. "That you're just going to come to your senses—come back to him."

"That's not what it is—"

"Then why does he _think_ that? Delphine—" Cosima rubs her forehead roughly. "I have been here before. I have been the thing that somebody wants when they're not sure what they've wanted. I've had my heart treated like a vehicle through which some confused person could _find themselves._ And I just can't—" Her voice cracks, but she quickly tamps down on it, shaking her head. Her voice is soft when she says, "I can't do that with you. You _have_ to be sure. If for no other reason, then for me."

After a moment, simply watching Cosima, watching the fear, the panic flash through her eyes, Delphine nods. "Okay," she tells her. It is not something she can understand entirely—what Cosima has experienced. But she knows for a fact, can very clearly see, that this is hurting her. "Okay."

"Yeah?" Cosima raises one hand to her cheek again, smiling lightly, though her eyes are vulnerable. Delphine nods. After a moment, she laughs to herself.

"Timing," she mutters, shaking her head. "I'm sorry." She suddenly feels very ashamed. "Really." She backs away, as if heading for the door. Cosima grabs her wrist.

"Hey—" Tentatively, she says, "You don't have to go."

"I _should._ "

Cosima's brow furrows, as if she's weighing her options. Finally, she tells her, "Don't." She slips her hand into Delphine's, giving it a squeeze, before turning to crawl onto the bed, atop the sheets. She pats the other side of the mattress. The blonde takes a step forward, wavering. "We can just… watch TV. All right?"

It strikes Delphine as absurd almost, to lie next to each other doing something as banal as watching late night cable after what has just transpired between them. She has to smile, if only a little, as she sits beside Cosima, stretching her legs.

They say nothing to each other for the rest of the night, staring into the TV while some crude adult cartoon flashes across the screen, neither of them paying attention. Eventually, Delphine's head lolls onto her neck, her eyes drooping involuntarily as Cosima's distracted expression sits in her periphery. She hears her laugh once—a distant, staccato sound—before she fades out.

In the morning she wakes to a cold breeze spilling in through the open window, her body chilled, though Cosima must have placed the duvet over them at some point in the night. The television stills plays, bathing the dim room in a dull blue light. Delphine rolls onto her side and watches Cosima's chest rise and fall steadily, gripped by the sensation of having to catch her breath—the sudden fear that she will be unable to.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *head explodes*


	12. Twelve

Aunt Gert died on a Tuesday, some eleven years ago. Two days before, Cosima and her Pap had made their bi-weekly drive up to Gert's home in San Leandro. She'd lived in a 520 square ft. cabin on a small plot of land in the foothills, her cottage rarely able to accommodate more than a few visitors at the time. Cosima and Pap were her most frequent guests, with Cosima's parents making the hour drive as often as they were able (which was not very).

When they arrived on that Sunday in November, a bite to the California air that was downright bitter, the firs were still wet from the morning's frost. At Pap's insistence, Cosima had bundled herself in his brown suede jacket, grateful for his cossetting as she shivered from the car to Gert's porch, where she could smell the burning sage smudges permeating the knotted door.

As they walked inside, Gert was lying on the floor, her limbs bent at unnatural angles, cheek pressed into the wood floor as she spouted an incoherent stream of consciousness. Cosima remembers the urgency, the sheer panic with which Pap had shouted for her— _"Gert! Gert, dear!"_ —his only sibling, his oldest friend. _"You're burning up!"_ With her head cradled in his lap, Cosima grabbing a damp rag to place over her forehead, Pap had managed to draw her from her confusion.

She'd broken no limbs in her fall—had simply been too tired to stand, she'd explained. Her face was hot and the floorboards were cool; yet her body trembled with the chill of her illness. Pap, a strong man in his youth, growing frail with his own old age, had lifted Gert effortlessly in his arms and carried her to bed. _"Stay by her side,"_ he'd whispered in Cosima's ear, as she instantly took the woman's hand in her own. _"I'm calling for an ambulance."_ It was meant to be a secret. Gert didn't believe in modern medicine – didn't "believe" in hospitals. Cosima doubted she was in any condition to protest, however.

As Pap went outside to make his call, Cosima cleared her throat and spoke, _"Aunt Gert,"_ she asked tentatively, though the woman's eyes had already glazed, fixed on distant images. She muttered under her breath. _"What's did you say?"_

Gert looked at her then, though Cosima was certain she couldn't see her. It was unnerving. _"'To see ourselves as others see us is a most salutary gift. Hardly less important is the capacity to see others as they see themselves,'"_ she began, her voice startlingly lucid, insistent. _"'But what if these others belong to a different species and inhabit a radically alien universe?'"_ She found this proclamation so pressing, in fact, that when Cosima offered her no answer, mouth frozen in a hesitant gawp, she asked it again. And again.

Cosima could only clutch her hand tighter, the woman's gaze fixing immediately on her brother as he returned to the room, cheeks ruddy. _"'How can the sane get to know what it actually feels like to be mad,'"_ she asked him, voice wheezing suddenly before erupting in a dry, hacking cough.

" _Christ, Gert!"_ he'd shouted, rushing forward to pull her into a sitting position, rubbing her back. Her hand clutched Cosima's so tightly the girl had to resist wincing. Suddenly, after what felt like several minutes, her grip slackened, and she pulled back from her brother, breathless.

Staring at him, wide-eyed, she rasped without provocation, _"I've found myself, Conrad. I've found—"_

" _What are you talking about?"_

With eerie calmness, her head turned from the man to Cosima, mouth quirked into a gentle, bewildering smile. _"I see you,"_ she'd whispered. _"And I see myself."_ She lost consciousness not a moment later.

They were the last words Gert had ever spoken. She spent the next two days drifting in and out of consciousness before her lungs stopped working, heart soon following. The cause, the doctors told them, had been pneumonia.

Why Cosima is thinking of this now, sitting on a bench in the hotel's laundry room, staring intently into the washer's spin cycle, she has no clue.

 _How can the sane get to know what it actually feels like to be mad?_ It hadn't been nonsense. The words, though Gert must have felt them poignant enough to commit to memory, had been Aldous Huxley's. Cosima had googled them a month after her passing, had read the book— _The Doors of Perception & Heaven and Hell —_the very next day. She'd started experimenting with drugs not long after.

Some transcendence it had inspired, she thinks, allowing her head to fall back against the gaudily patterned wallpaper with a yawn. Years of filling her lungs with smoke, boiling strange herbs, eating bitter flora for the chance to catch some sort of inward glance. Gert had seen her that cold November day, her death already looming. What would Cosima have to do to see herself?

Pap had lived clean for over thirty decades before his death. He'd already begun losing faith in mysticism by the time he was Cosima's age. _"A quarter of a century worn and already/hip to the trifling gravitas of the cosmos,"_ he'd once written in a poem, later included in his first published book—now stuffed in the bottom of Cosima's suitcase, always close at hand. His own death had arrived without compunction, without spectacle—a sudden, fatal heart attack four years after his sister.

Gert had never truly given up on mysticism. One bad trip when she was nineteen, and dogma had dug its claws into her irrevocably. Cosima feared the same fate could befall her. _"I see you, and I see myself."_ Could she see herself _in_ Cosima? A familiar temperament, similar fancies and fears?

Music had always been about interiority to her. Every time she stepped on a stage, she was turning her gaze inward, looking. _"Are you still searching,"_ Delphine had asked her the night before. At the time she said she didn't know, but she realized only moments later that she did. She's still searching for respite, searching for a way to reconcile herself.

She realized this the second Delphine had kissed her.

"'… _the miracle, moment by moment, of naked existence.'"_ —that is how Huxley had later described looking at a vase of flowers while high on mescaline. Cosima had admired the sentiment for its beauty when she was a teenager, but it has seemed emptier the older she's grown.

Beauty is a lot easier to come by when you're a kid, when your obligations are few. There's more time for admiration when things are handed to you. Until suddenly you're in your twenties, a college dropout living on your best friend's couch, and you're smoking just to forget that your parents are disagree with you, that you don't have the money to get that tooth pulled or that you've never felt steady enough to maintain a relationship for longer than six months. You're smoking, and you're staring at a vase of flowers, and Aldous Huxley can go fuck himself, because sometimes flowers are just flowers. Sometimes we are our face values. Sometimes there is no inner light to mitigate the shadows of a banal existence.

Maybe she's clung to performance because it's the closest to spirituality she'll ever get; because on stage she is granted the "salutary gift" of seeing herself through the eyes of the crowd. Then again, it's a gift Delphine has given her, too. To see herself at times through the woman's smile, her laughter. To see herself as something whole and strong.

She tries not to obsess over it, but she can't stop thinking of the way Delphine had looked at her the night before, in that moment right before she'd kissed her. It wasn't just a look of, _"You're beautiful—I want you."_ That had been there, too, of course. She flushes just considering it. But somewhere—not beneath it even, but right on top, with the sort of obviousness that it often easy to miss entirely—there had been a tenderness without return. _"You_ deserve _to be cared for,"_ it had told her, whether or not Delphine had meant it to.

She draws in a shuddering breath, rubbing the heels of her palms into her eyes. She's too old to even be thinking it, but with the ghost of Delphine's lips still lingering upon hers almost twelve hours later, the belief asserts itself anyway.

_She felt like the flowers._

"Well, well. Look who it is." Cosima's head snaps up suddenly, hearing the smirk in Beth Childs' voice before she ever sees it.

"Hey, Beth."

Still smiling wryly, Beth strolls over to the washer nearest hers. "Wanna see how much fun you missed last night?" She holds up a large collared shirt, stained sloppily down the front. "That's my fifth pint, right there," she explains, pointing to it. "All over poor Paul's favorite Marc Jacobs shirt." Cosima laughs as she throws it into the washer. "Pray it washes out. Otherwise I'm out 200 bucks."

"That was $200?"

"Oh yeah."

"I'm pretty sure you can get that same shirt at Target for $20."

"Lifestyles of the rich and famous," Beth drawls, rolling her eyes. "He's got a thing for brands." As she's pouring in her detergent, eyes fixed on the task at hand, she coyly remarks, "So, you spent the night with Delphine."

Cosima tries not to react. "She tell you that?"

"No." Beth turns to her, eyes scrutinizing before she smiles lightly. "I think you just did though." Cosima pauses a moment, nodding hesitantly, unsure if Beth is baiting her into a trap. "Wasn't hard to figure out. Everyone came out last night. Even Duncan showed her face long enough to slurp down a couple of martinis."

"Really?"

"Yeah," Beth chuckles, still a bit shocked herself. She turns the dial on her machine, taking a seat next to Cosima.

"Wow. Weren't we antisocial."

"Well," Beth begins, drawing out the word as she turns to face Cosima. "I'm sure you two had _plenty_ of fun together." The insinuation is unmistakable. Had it been delivered by one of Delphine's other bandmates, she might be irked. Beth has been nothing but trustworthy thus far though.

"We did. We just… hung out. Watched some TV, smoked a little weed—"

"You got Del to smoke with you," the bassist asks, impressed.

Cosima shrugs. "It's not like I had to twist her arm or anything."

"Damn. Was she fun?" Suddenly, Cosima's mind conjures an image of the two of them sitting in the bathtub, Delphine's curls spilling into her lap as her body shakes with giggles.

"Very," she tells her, mouth dry.

"Huh. You know, I can't even get her to drink with me half the time."

"Well, _I've_ drank with you. I can kind of understand why she wouldn't."

"This about last weekend?" Beth shakes her head, playfully defensive. "You were ripped of your own volition on Saturday, Cos." She pauses, glancing sidelong at the guitarist. "And, as I recall, you still managed to get lucky." They both sober, Cosima averting her gaze. After a moment, Beth asks her, with an honest sense of curiosity. "Have you been talking to Maddie?"

"No," she answers cautiously. "I mean, we exchanged numbers—as a formality. But it was just… sex. No strings."

"Ahh." Beth nods, though it is obvious her curiosity has not yet been sated. "She seemed to like you."

Cosima laughs uncomfortably. "She liked, uh… my body? And my music, I guess." After a moment, she meets Beth's eyes. "I think she was just kinda horny."

Beth chuckles. "Fair enough." Clearing her throat, she asks, "And you?"

She chooses her answer carefully. "I don't really do the whole groupie thing, Beth. I typically don't do hookups, in general. But it had been a while and she was… _really_ forward."

"No judgment," Beth assures her. "I get that. I was just wondering. Sorry if I'm being nosy."

"No, it's fine. Madison is your friend, right? I understand."

"Yeah." The answer is a little clipped, as if a _but_ or an _and_ has been cut off. Cosima sits up a little straighter.

"Is there something in particular you're trying to get at?" Cosima doesn't ask it accusatorily.

Beth can only shrug, staring ahead into the washer. After a long pause she asks, "You and Delphine just got high and watched TV all night?"

"What else would we have done?" Beth hesitates for a long moment, blowing out a steady breath between her lips. "Look, I know you and Delphine are friends. But I don't know how much you guys reveal to each other… like, about your feelings. So, all I'm going to say is—she made hers pretty clear last night."

Beth's eyes widen, her head tilting to the side. "Did she?" Cosima nods. " _Oh._ Well, okay then." After a moment, she asks, "How were those feelings received?" Cosima has to laugh at how uncouth she sounds. "What?"

"Dude, your interrogation skills are a little flimsy."

"Cut me some slack. It's not like I'm looking to join the police academy anytime soon."

"Smart choice." She swallows her chuckles suddenly, shaking her head with a soft smile. Looking down at her hands, she says, "They were well received."

Beth seems pleased by this answer, though she tries not to show it. "Cool."

"Yeah… very cool."

They sit in silence for a moment until Beth tells her, "'Cause, you know—I'm just saying—had they not been, I do have a few unsavory photos on my phone. It would be a shame for them to end up on Twitter…"

If not for Beth's shit-eating smirk, Cosima might actually feel threatened. "Unsavory photos?"

"We're two weeks into this thing. I've got an entire album called _Cosima Puking._ "

"Seriously?" Beth pulls out her phone, bringing up the photo album for Cosima to see. She tries to grab the phone, but Beth yanks it from her reach, laughing. Cosima's forced glare is split almost immediately by a grin. "Fuck you, dude."

"Just something to keep in mind, Niehaus." She flashes Cosima a dangerous smile. "Play nice."

* * *

"You're talking to yourself."

Cosima's pulse skips, gaze lifting to the soft voice carried in from the doorway. Her hand tightens over the spine of her book, finger stilled in the middle of the page where she'd been tracing verses. "Just reading."

"Am I disturbing you," Delphine asks earnestly, bottom lip caught between her teeth.

"Of course not," Cosima waves her in. "Wanna sit?" She gestures to the open space beside her on the green room couch. Delphine nods, smiling gently as she takes a seat, leaving over a foot of space between them. "You can sit a little closer, you know—if you want."

Delphine chuckles nervously, curling her legs beneath her. With her arm over the back of the couch, she glances down at Cosima's book.

"What are you reading?"

"Poetry." Blushing slightly, she glances back down at the page she'd marked. "I'm in a sentimental mood, I suppose," she explains sarcastically.

"Sentimental, hmm?" Delphine is smirking when she meets her gaze. "And _who_ exactly, are you reading?"

Cosima holds up the book, displaying the burgundy cover with a smile. "None other than the revered Conrad Niehaus."

"A relative," Delphine asks, quirking an eyebrow.

"My grandfather. The one in the photo last night."

Delphine smiles. "He was a poet?"

"It was 1969. Everyone was a poet," she laughs.

"Can I see?" Cosima hands her the book, watching as she flips delicately through its pages, careful hands seeking every crease, annotation, and dog-ear. Cosima's eyes fix on the length of Delphine's fingers, their fluidity as they trace both Pap's words and her own handwritten notes.

"He was a craftsman, actually—a carpenter. Writing was just a hobby."

After a moment's pause, Delphine's eye skittering across the page, she distractedly remarks, "He was very good for a hobbyist."

"He was smart, nostalgic—wicked combination."

"And I see you had a lot to say about it," she says, running a finger over Cosima's annotations. Looking up to her meet her gaze, she smiles wistfully. "Maybe you've got a bit of that in yourself, too." Cosima shrugs, leaning in a bit closer to the other woman. Delphine's attention returns to the book, though she seems to still be watching her.

"That would be nice," she mutters, watching as Delphine flips several pages to a prominent dog-ear, the guitarist's crude illustrations inked into the margins.

Delphine runs her finger down the scrawling text, stilling at the bottom of the page. Her eyes flicker back and forth, the same stanza repeating in her head. Cosima glances over the top of the page, a few of her dreads spilling onto Delphine's shoulder, her collarbone.

"'Dust,'" Cosima says, reading the title. Like most of the poems in Pap's book, she knows it by heart. Resting her cheek lazily against her palm, she pensively recites, _"In the curdled, crooked pre-dawn, my face shone/smooth and gray as a stone in the pocket of a drowning woman./Wrists baying each fluttering beat/the space between, whereupon letters of longing are penned./You had not yet loved me, but already I knew/to not be loved by you, was to not be loved at all."_

After a moment's pause, running her fingers up the page, Delphine glances up, face flushed. "It's lovely."

"Sentimental, remember," Cosima asks, shrugging.

"Right." Delphine flips through the pages once more, smiling. Cosima watches her for a few moments, studying the soft edges of her face with embarrassing attentiveness. She can't help but think of their closeness the night before, the way her heart had pounded with pleasure while her stomach simultaneously twisted with panic. It had seemed so likely then that everything that transpired was some unbelievable pot-haze—the heady aftermath of Delphine's failing relationship. But their ease now, the unconscious proximity of their bodies, stupidly disavows her of this fear.

"I wanna tell you," Cosima begins, her hand falling between the pages of the book, ceasing their turning. "Last night—" Delphine meets her gaze, eyes anxious. Taking a deep breath, Cosima says, "I'm glad you kissed me. I liked it." Swallowing, she continues, "I liked that you _wanted_ to kiss me."

Delphine's shoulders seem to relax. "I did," she assures her.

"And I know I stopped you, but it wasn't because I didn't want it. I just—" She hesitates, biting the inside of her cheek. "I wanted you to have some time to think about it, because… you know." Delphine nods, glancing down at Cosima's hand, still resting on the book. She runs her fingertips over the tops of Cosima's, tracing her knuckles. "And also, I want you to know… I really like you. I mean—yeah. So, last night, if that was just… if you need to take it back—"

"Cosima—"

"—I won't hold it against you." Delphine is quiet for a few moments, playing with Cosima's fingertips before she spreads her palm over top hers.

"You think I would take it back," the blonde asks, voice quiet.

"Maybe." She pauses, swallowing. "Two weeks seems fairly inconsequential compared to two years." She averts her eyes, instead turning over her hand beneath Delphine's, running her calloused fingertips over her palm. The blonde runs her thumb over Cosima's wrist, where her pulse beats quickly.

After a long moment of silence, Delphine asks her, "Do you know the difference between a pragmatist and poet?"

The corner of Cosima's mouth upturns slightly. "Enlighten me."

"The poet would think two years seemed inconsequential compared to two weeks."

"I should probably keep reading then, huh?" She slides the book out of Delphine's grasp, her wrist still captured.

"Cosima, look at me." Tentatively, the brunette meets her gaze, brow gently furrowed. Delphine begins chewing on her lip. Squeezing her wrist tighter, she asks her again, "You think I'm going to take it back?"

After a moment, drawing in a breath, Cosima irreverently replies, "Well… not right _now._ " Unable to stop herself, Delphine laughs. It's hard to believe anything is going to end when she looks at her that way. "It's not life-or-death though, is it," the guitarist asks, her smile growing.

"No, it's not." Leaning against Cosima's shoulder, she says, "That's why I like it."

"Because we can figure it out later?"

"Yeah," she mutters as Cosima threads a hand through her hair again, tucking a strand behind her ear. "That's exactly why."

* * *

It's a beautiful night. Clear skies dotted endlessly with stars, cool breezes, the distant traffic buzzing pleasantly outside of the stadium. With her iPod in hand, she'd climbed up the hood of the van onto the roof not an hour before. Lying there now, she stares up into the streetlamps, jet planes passing over head, her mind drifting to the words of Conrad Niehaus.

" _What if I didn't go to college? What if, instead, I gave the music thing a shot—just played full time?"_ That was what she had asked him on the last Sunday afternoon they ever spent together, the last Sunday of his life. They'd been sitting at the kitchen table in his tiny apartment, tucked up against the window with barely enough space to keep their backs from knocking against the walls.

Eyes wide over his coffee cup, Pap had told her, _"Well, I think you could do that."_

" _Really?"_ She hadn't spoken of the idea yet, but she was sure her parents would disapprove. And while Pap was often supportive, he'd grown practical in his old age. She wasn't sure if he'd be able to understand either.

" _You're damn good, kid."_ He took a sip of his coffee and glanced out the window, the Golden Gate visible in the distance, enshrouded in fog. _"You sit down with a guitar, and it just comes to you."_ She smiled, her heart beating fondly at his vote of confidence. Taking another sip of his drink, he turned back from the window to glance softly at her. _"The problem is though, you sit down, and sometimes you just don't get back up."_

" _What do you mean?"_

" _Tunnel vision,"_ he told her, eyes squinted as he tapped his temple with a knobby finger. _"Your pop told me you skipped your prom."_

" _So?"_

Shaking his head, he set the cup down on the table. _"So? You're eighteen."_

" _And I'm ambitious"_

" _You're young."_ Smiling, almost amusedly, he told her. _"You don't know nothin'."_ Seeing her ready to protest, he lifted up a hand. _"You're passionate—I respect that. But there's a difference between passion and plain avoidance. You sit down there in that basement every day for hours playing music. There's no ulterior motive there? You can't fool the old guy, kiddo. I know. You spend damn near every Sunday with me."_

She stared down at the tabletop, her own steaming mug held tightly between her palms, eyes burning suddenly.

" _C'mon now, darlin',"_ he said, reaching across the table to coax her hand into his. Still, she wouldn't meet his eyes. _"I'm not saying you can't do it, or that you shouldn't. Hell, I'll support you either way. I'm just saying, you gotta be careful. Live a little."_ Pausing, he chuckled. _"A little. I don't want to hear you're doing as much living as I did when I was your age."_ The corners of her mouth quirked just slightly. _"You do what you love, all right—what makes you happy. But don't hide yourself away for it."_

" _I'm not hiding,"_ she told him firmly, finally meeting his gaze.

" _You sure about that?"_

" _Yeah,"_ she scoffed. He raised his eyebrows, clearly amused.

" _You're spending too much time around this old bastard,"_ he chuckled. _"My sour attitude is rubbing off on you."_ Finally, she smirked. _"Call it what you will. Ambition, you said?"_ At her narrowed eyes, he conceded. _"Okay—ambition. I won't begrudge you that. But you're still young. I think you'll be surprised—you venture outside of that basement and you're likely to meet some people who will challenge that ambition of yours. Maybe even in a way that'll really throw you for a loop."_ Picking up his mug, he downed the rest of his coffee in two large gulps, smacking his lips as he set the cup back on the table. _"Now—you can forget the rest of what I've said if need be, but I'm telling you—you find somebody who can do_ that _to you, you gotta stick with them."_

It's not until her phone vibrates against the roof of the car that she realizes she's been drifting. Picking it up, she sees a text from Delphine flash across the screen.

" _Where are you?"_

" _Back at the van. Why?"_ A minute passes, and there's no reply. Feeling eager, she sends another text. _"Where are you?"_

Delphine never responds. Instead, a couple minutes later, Cosima sees her walking across the parking lot, hands buried in her pockets. She sits up on top of the van, waving. The blonde smiles back at her, timidly.

She's about to swing her legs over the side when Delphine waves her off. "No, stay," she tells her.

"You gonna join me then?" Shrugging, Delphine hoists herself up onto the hood of the van. Cosima reaches out a hand to her, pulling her up. "I was looking for you," she says as the blonde settles herself on the roof.

"I thought you might be." She sits cross-legged, opposite Cosima, shoulders hunched. Her head is bowed, too, hidden under a fall of unruly curls. She draws a hand through them, sweeping them messily to the other side of her head.

"Hey—" She lifts her head at the softness of Cosima's tone, her face captured in the dim ocher light cast by the nearest streetlamp. The shadows lengthen beneath her eyes, which skitter tiredly from Cosima to her lap, back to the parking lot. "You okay?"

"I, uh—" The brunette's heart seizes for a moment. Has the regret kicked in? Anxiously, she begins turning the rings over on her fingers. Taking a deep breath, Delphine continues, "I did it. During your set tonight, I called Mark, and I just… ended it—for good."

Cosima's eyes widen, her heart thumping. "Really?" There's a part of her that feels elated, excited.

"Yeah." But there is another part of her that recognizes the heaviness of Delphine's shoulders, the sadness in her gaze, a part that feels more concerned.

Scooting closer, Cosima rubs her arm, ducking her head to capture her eyes. "And you're all right?" Delphine sighs exasperatedly, running her hands through her hair.

When she speaks, her voice trembles slightly. "I don't know. I'm… I'm sure I did the right thing. And in a way I feel so _relieved._ I mean—it was just so empty, you know?" Cosima nods. "But I feel… I feel bad—guilty. I think I probably fell out of love with him a while ago. It's hard to pinpoint. But I _do_ care for him. He was always good to me." After a pause, she meets Cosima's eyes. "I never expected I would break his heart like this."

Cosima takes a deep breath, unsure of what to say. If she's being honest with herself, she feels pretty bad for Mark, too. She can't imagine what it would be like to be left by Delphine Cormier, but she's sure it's pretty unpleasant.

She pulls the blonde against her shoulder, holding her. Immediately, Delphine's arms wrap tightly around her middle. Cosima can feel her breathing against her, deeply.

"I'd prefer the clean break though, to being stuck in something that's, like, falling apart, right beneath your feet." Clearing her throat, Cosima tells her. "You were kinda doing him a favor, ending it now."

"You're biased," Delphine says quietly into her neck, though she can feel the hint of a smile. She shivers at the warmth of the blonde's breath, the vibrations of her words humming into her throat.

"Very." Pulling back slightly, she kisses Delphine's cheek. "I'm sorry you're upset though."

"Thank you."

"Of course," Cosima mutters, lifting her hand to cradle Delphine's jaw. She kisses her cheek again, tentatively. Then, after a pause, just beneath her eye, her temple—running a hand through her messy hair. Delphine chuckles suddenly, her teeth faint against the brunette's throat. Cosima's entire body flushes. "What's so funny?"

"Keep kissing me." Smiling, she complies, kissing her forehead, her hair. She cradles her cheeks, lifting her face to kiss the tip of her nose, Delphine's eyes closed, the corners crinkled. Slowly, they flutter open, and she watches Cosima. "It's just funny—I never expected you."

Cosima grins. "Surprise?" Delphine swallows noticeably, and her grin grows softer. They simply watch each other for a moment before Cosima asks, "Honestly though, you're okay?"

"I'll _be_ okay." The blonde leans forward, her lips just a hair's breadth from Cosima's, causing her pulse to stutter.

"Maybe better than okay?" Sensing each other's halting anticipation, they each press forward at the same time. Unlike last night, they do not surge, do not caress with vague desperation, the feeling that they could be torn from each other at a moment's notice. Instead, they are gentle, curious. Consoling.

Delphine's mouth is sweet, but also pleasantly sour with the aftertaste of mint and what Cosima imagines to be wine. Her tongue slowly entreats with small, diffident strokes, drawing the brunette closer. One hand tangles in the woman's tousled curls, the other trailing down to her collarbone, thumb brushing gently. She's drawing her fingertips back up Delphine's neck when the blonde nips at her lip, tugging her forward by the back of her neck. Cosima's breath hitches. She feels feverish.

Moving her hand down to the blonde's waist, she begins peppering warm kisses along her jaw. Delphine giggles, the sound both nervous and needy. The brunette smiles into her skin.

"Cosima—" Her voice is breathy, excited, setting Cosima's body aflame. "I—"

"Cormier! Niehaus!" They pull apart, dazed, hearts pounding at the sound of Rachel Duncan's cold voice. They turn to her, wide-eyed, as she marches briskly towards the van. "Get down from there," she commands.

"Shit," Cosima laughs, glancing once at Delphine, who has her face buried in her hands, attempting to hold in her giggles. Feeling a bit unsteady, Cosima slides off the roof, offering up a hand to help Delphine down.

"What are you two thinking," Rachel hisses.

"Well, we—" Cosima begins, only for Duncan to cut her off, back straightening.

"First of all," she continues, fixing her gaze on Delphine. "I didn't even realize that _this_ —" _This_ being _Cosima_ , if her venomous side-eye is any indication. "—was happening." Cosima snorts, drawing Rachel's carefully composed ire. "And while I could not care less for the particulars of your impending drama, it is most certainly my business to ensure that whatever that drama _is_ does not leave our tour." Delphine and Cosima both go silent, the blonde seemingly shame-faced.

"Really, I'm quite surprised by your utter lack of discretion, Delphine, given the painful amount of confidentiality you dedicated to Mr. Rollins." It's an unnecessary barb, and Cosima can see it hits as intended.

"Hey, look—we got a little carried away, all right," Cosima interjects, stepping closer to Delphine. "It's not something that's happened before, and for the sake of… _maintaining_ discretion, or whatever, we can make sure it won't happen again."

Rachel turns to her slowly, expression taciturn. "Well, that's very nice to hear, Cosima. I understand that for a performer of your caliber—" Her tone is pointedly condescending. "—this sort of careless exhibitionism might seem exhilarating, but at DYAD we have a bit more concern for professional decorum."

"If that were entirely true I don't suppose that _I_ would have initiated this _careless exhibitionism_ ," Delphine says, stepping forward. If Rachel feels challenged, she doesn't show it, merely canting her chin haughtily in the drummer's direction. "Like Cosima said, we'll make sure to keep it to ourselves next time."

After a moment, sizing them both up, Rachel says, "I would certainly hope so. We have enough trouble trying to control the disaster that is Elizabeth Childs and Paul Dierden. I'd hope you wouldn't make the same mistakes."

"Your concern is duly noted, Rachel," Delphine replies, her tone sardonic.

The manager doesn't respond to it, however, instead turning to regard Cosima somewhat distastefully before telling them, "We'll be on the road in an hour. Don't hold us up."

As she's walking away, head held high, Delphine, scowling, mutters, " _Salope._ "

"No kidding," Cosima says. She isn't sure what the word translates to, but she has a few good ideas. Delphine continues to watch her walk away, brow knitted, eyes dark. "Hey—don't dwell on it," she tells her, tugging on her arm. "She's an asshole—so what? As long as we keep it to ourselves, she won't have reason to comment on it."

After another moment, Delphine shakes her head, glancing down at Cosima with a small smile. "You're right. Sorry." She slips her hand into Cosima's, squeezing. "Maybe we did get a little carried away, though… not that I minded."

Cosima chuckles as they begin walking back towards the stadium. "You _definitely_ didn't."

"Shut up."

"Just saying, had she not shown up…" Cosima trails off, having intended the statement as a tease. However, the thought of what could have happened has her flushing, a quick thrum of heat surging through her belly. Delphine seems equally as distracted—nervous even. Attempting to shake off the awkwardness, the brunette playfully comments, "And correct me if I'm wrong, but it did seem like you were _defending my honor_ a little bit."

Smirking, Delphine shrugs. "I'm quite noble, aren't I?"

"Oh, My Lady," Cosima teases, fanning herself. "You make me swoon."


	13. Thirteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fair warning: end of the chapter earns the M rating.

They're alone in the hotel elevator, Delphine standing close beside her—close enough that her bare arm rubs Cosima's, fingertips skittering lightly over each other's—when the warmth from the other woman's body floods into the brunette, rushing to her cheeks. Staring straight ahead into the tinted elevator glass, she can see the blonde's head bowed, eyes watching their hands brush together while chewing thoughtfully on her lip.

It's pointless, maybe, but she thinks to herself, _this beautiful woman wants to touch me,_ and her stomach twists. Because she wants to touch her, too. But she also thinks she could stand beside her, arms pressed together, and _watch_ Delphine holding her hand in the glass' reflection for hours and feel equally excited.

It's unusual for her, to find comfortable inside of the anticipation. Content to merely sit back and watch the feeling crest, without the panicky impulse to move, to react. She wonders if she feels this way in spite of the fact that they haven't yet slept together, or because of it. Oddly enough, the _lack_ of nerves makes her feel nervous.

The elevator is coming to a stop in the lobby when Cosima blurts, "Do you want to go out with me?" Delphine's head snaps up suddenly, wide-eyed, a little curious. "I mean, like—hang out. Do you want to go _out_ with me—somewhere—to hang out?"

Delphine shows her teeth, chuckling. "I thought we already were?"

"Well," the elevator door opens, and they step out together, maintaining little distance, "we were going to hang out on the bus, maybe get some food. But I'm talking about _going out_ going out. I've only been to Detroit once before, so it'd be kind of nice to go explore a little." Delphine looks up thoughtfully for a moment, considering. "Or, maybe you don't want to go out because, you know—famous musician. But I thought—" She shrugs, suddenly feeling a bit embarrassed for even asking. "—I don't know. You could just dress inconspicuously. People might not notice."

Quirking a brow, Delphine glances down at her outfit – jeans, flannel, a black leather jacket. "I think I'm dressed rather pedestrian as it is," she remarks, smiling.

"Okay, good point. There's something about you in that leather jacket though—very rock and roll. I don't think I could pull it off to quite the same effect."

Delphine stops suddenly in the middle of the lobby, eyeing Cosima up and down. After a moment, she pulls off her jacket, gesturing to the brunette's tan sweater. "Let's trade," she tells her.

"Uhm, okay." Cosima feels too warm not to oblige, pulling the sweater over her head, nothing but a simple white tank top beneath, and hands it to Delphine. In return, she takes the blonde's jacket and puts it on. It's a little big on her, particularly in the sleeves, but it's warm and smells softly fragrant, like soap and powder. Like Delphine, she realizes, heat creeping up her neck.

Her own sweater, which had been about two sizes too big on her small frame, just as she prefers, appears more fitting on Delphine. The blonde adjusts the collar of her flannel shirt beneath it while Cosima watches her, mouth gone dry. Her chest feels tight, too.

"It fits you well," Cosima says, catching Delphine's attention. She looks up, first meeting Cosima's eyes, her gaze quickly falling to the jacket. Taking half a step forward, she tugs at the lapels, trying to hide her smile, but succeeding only in carving the dimples deep in her cheeks.

"You don't know what you're talking about," she says, her voice coming out low. "You pull this off very well."

"Rad." Cosima swallows, very aware of Delphine's gaze on her. "Maybe I'll be the one beating back admirers now," she says sarcastically.

Delphine raises a brow. "Maybe," she slowly replies. Then, meeting Cosima's eyes again, she asks, "Where did you want to go?"

Cosima shrugs, "Wherever. I heard the Detroit Institute of Arts is pretty awesome. We could go check out some paintings. It would be quiet." Delphine nods, considering this. "We've got hours though. We can go anywhere—anywhere you'd like."

After a pause, Delphine says, "Let's go to the zoo."

"The zoo," Cosima asks, surprised.

"Yeah. You don't like the zoo?"

"Sure I do. I haven't been to one in years though."

Delphine smiles sheepishly. "Last time we were here, it was on a beautiful day, just like this—in the spring. And I really wanted to go to the zoo, but…" She shrugs. "Nobody else was into it."

"Really?" Delphine nods. "Well, if I'm being honest, walking around the zoo sounds way more fun than walking around some stuffy museum." Cosima smiles, the blonde quickly matching her expression.

* * *

It would be difficult for her not to indulge Delphine's every whim; however, the blonde is so agreeable that doing so is far from a chore. Cosima would have found it enjoyable to study the intricacies of impressionist works, standing beside Delphine in silence. But it _is_ a beautiful day – bright, cloudless, with even temperatures – and the Detroit zoo is abuzz with laughter, mostly families and eager children. The odds of Delphine being noticed among throngs of kids are slimmer than at the museum.

They talk constantly, volleying questions back and forth, Delphine telling stories of her childhood in France, Cosima of her youth in the San Francisco bay. They share embarrassments and ghost stories. They talk of things that don't matter, Cosima very aware of the way she clings to each trifling fragment, storing them carefully away.

"What is your favorite animal," Delphine asks her as they lean against the railing of the lion exhibit, eating snow cones.

"Elephant."

"And why is that?" Delphine takes a demure bite of the shaved ice, her lips staining shades of neon from the syrup.

"I just think they're beautiful," Cosima shrugs. "Well, for one thing. Growing up, my parents and I would visit the east coast a few times a year. My aunt and uncle live outside of Philadelphia, so we'd go visit them, spend days in the city. They've got a great zoo there, too."

"I've never been." Delphine rests her arm over the railing, shielding her eyes from the bright sunlight beating down on her. Squinting, she watches Cosima poke her tongue carefully around the snow cone. It's turned a bright shade of blue.

"Maybe we'll visit this week," she smiles. "I don't know if they still do, but when I was a kid, you could ride elephants there—you know, just walking around in a circle—but still. I thought that was, like, the coolest thing when I was six. My cousin and I, maybe 80 pounds between us, riding on the back of a 10,000 pound elephant. Kind of incredible, when you're that small."

Delphine smirks. "A little different than riding a pony, I'd imagine."

"Same concept, just bigger," Cosima smiles, turning to lean her back against the railing. Her tongue darts out from her mouth to lap up the syrup that melts over the top of the cone, distracting Delphine. "What's your favorite?"

"Oh, uhm," she returns her attention to her own snow cone, forcing herself to look away, to focus on the conversation. "I like foxes."

"Why is that?"

" _Rox et Rouky_ —my favorite movie when I was little. Uhm, _The Fox and the Hound,_ is the English title."

"Oh," Cosima says, recognition clicking. "The cartoon."

"Yes. You've seen it?"

"Yeah, yeah. I used to watch Disney movies all the time when I was kid. I was more of a _Robin Hood_ fan though."

"Steal from the rich, give to the poor."

"Like a true outlaw," Cosima nods sagely, grinning.

"I guess I shouldn't be surprised. I've never really cared much for movies about heroes and villains though. Not even when I was small."

"Well, all movies—all stories—are about heroes and villains, if you think about it."

Delphine tilts her head, conceding, "Yes, I suppose. In some ways. But I think you know what I mean. Adventure movies, books—never really interested me."

"But—" Cosima scrunches her nose slightly, attempting to imitate Delphine's accent. " _Rox et Rouky_ —" The blonde cringes. "—I tried," she laughs. " _Fox and the Hound_ —that's more your speed?"

"It's sweet. It's about friendship." Delphine shrugs, looking out at the lions. "The stories I care the most about have always been relationship stories. Platonic, familial. Romantic. Things that can be simple and organic, yet still utterly complicated. I like those the best."

"You like complicated relationships," Cosima asks cheekily, tipping back her snow cone to drink the melted remains from the bottom.

"I said _stories._ And maybe complicated isn't the best word. I like things that you have to work for—that are worth working for." A bit of neon blue syrup dribbles out of Cosima's cone, rolling down her chin. Delphine takes a step forward. "You're making a mess of yourself," she says, brushing the sticky liquid off of Cosima's face with her thumb.

Cosima smiles, aware of the way Delphine's thumb lingers, hand cupping her chin. After watching her for a moment, she says, "It was a good movie, honestly." The brunette's face grows both softer and more impudent at the same time, her eyes glinting. _"We'll always be friends forever. Won't we, Copper,"_ she asks, somewhat sarcastically.

With the hand that had previously been cupping Cosima's chin, Delphine swats her on the arm. "Don't tease me," she scolds, turning away to throw her snow cone in the nearest trashcan.

"I'm not," Cosima chuckles, rushing forward to grab her by the elbow.

"Really," Delphine asks skeptically, turning to her with a raised brow, though her cheeks still flame with warmth, amusement.

"I swear," she incredulously tells her, smirking, the radiant light gleaming on her cheeks. Delphine is measuring her, gaze playfully narrowed, when Cosima feels her phone vibrating in her back pocket. She's ignored a couple of text messages since they arrived, but as the phone hums incessantly, she finally cedes. "Sorry, hold on a minute," she tells Delphine apologetically, pulling out the phone. "It's Fee—hey," she answers.

"Oh. _Hey_ ," he replies curtly, tone clearly exasperated. Cosima frowns, watching the blonde amble over to the adjoining exhibit to offer her some privacy.

"What's up?"

Felix scoffs. "I suppose you haven't bothered to check your text messages."

"Well—"

"I get it—you're canoodling with the rock star. But we've got a legitimate situation on our hands right now. I don't think Sarah's going to be able to perform tonight."

"What? Is she okay?" Delphine glances back at her with a raised brow, fixing her with an inquiring look.

"I'm pretty damn sure she's got food poisoning. Fucking gas station burritos," he mutters.

"Shit, Fee," Cosima groans. "Does she need to go to the hospital?"

"According to _her_ she's not at that point yet. But you know how stubborn she can be about this kind of stuff."

"Yeah, I know." She runs a hand through her dreads, concern and disappointment mingling. Delphine comes to stand beside her, mouthing, _"Everything okay?"_ Cosima nods unconvincingly.

"In any case, she can't stay out of the bathroom. Unless her body miraculously expunges this virus in the next few hours, there's no way she'll be fit to play."

"Damnit." She rubs at her forehead, aggravated. Nautilus have never missed a show before. They've played through sprained ankles, broken fingers, strep throat, family death. Right now though, they're very far away from home, and their options are few. Sighing, she tells Felix, "We'll come back, okay? We can figure it out then. Just… make sure she stays hydrated. And if _you_ think she needs to go to the hospital, make her."

She's mostly quiet in the cab on the way back to the hotel, a little anxious. Food poisoning isn't exactly something they can prepare for on the road. It's one of those isolated circumstances that crops up out of the blue, blindsiding them. Sarah has performed sick before, so Cosima knows if she's throwing in the towel this early, it can't be good.

It's unavoidable, maybe, but she still feels bad. This isn't _their_ tour, but she knows for a fact there are a few people at every show that do come just for them. She doesn't want to let anybody down.

"Cosima." With the stadium visible in the distance, she turns to glance at Delphine. "Is there another option, aside from not playing—if Sarah can't drum?"

Cosima turns the rings over on her fingers. "I guess Fee and I _could_ play unplugged. I'd be really nervous to do that though. It's an arena rock show. Nobody is coming for acoustic. I'm afraid we wouldn't be well received."

Delphine nods slowly, staring ahead, her brow dipping slightly. "I can understand that," she says.

"There's not much we can do," Cosima admits, sounding defeated. "I guess it wouldn't make a difference to most of the audience, but there's definitely people who look forward to seeing _us_ —I know that. I hate canceling on them." Delphine hums her agreement. After a pause, she turns abruptly to Cosima.

"What if I filled in?"

Cosima's brow hikes. "Well… you've never played with us before."

"I've played with _you_ ," Delphine points out.

"Yeah, but not on drums." Cosima tilts her head slightly, considering the suggestion. She has to admit, the idea of Delphine backing her on stage is thrilling. However, she's not sure how plausible it is. On one hand, the audience isn't likely to notice the variation in drum fills in the same way they might an altered guitar riff. On the other, there'd be an awful lot of improvisation involved. "You're good though. _Really_ good," she concedes.

Delphine grins, bottom lip between her teeth. "Not just that, Cosima. I've watched you play the same set every day for over two weeks. By now, I know your songs. I mean, I may not have every flourish or solo memorized, but I know the cadences, the timing. I think I'm skilled enough to fill in the rest on my own."

Cosima stares at her for a moment, a slow smile spreading across her face. "And you'd be okay with that? Just… jumping into our set—no practice?"

"We'll have sound check," Delphine shrugs. Cosima can't help but laugh, the sound equal parts disbelieving and eager. They _will_ have sound check, but both know that it's no substitute for a proper practice. Unable to restrain herself, she leans forward and captures the blonde's lips gratefully.

Hands on Delphine's cheeks, she tells her, "We'll have to make sure it's okay with Sarah—don't want to step on her toes."

"Of course," the blonde nods eagerly.

Cosima laughs again, shaking her head before she gives her another peck on the lips. "You're saving our asses tonight. God, I—" She has to stop herself, heart pounding, from finishing that statement. _I love you,_ is what she'd been ready to tell her. And maybe it would have been said in the exhilaration, the gratitude she feels—the kind of thing she'd say to any friend—but not just. Not with Delphine, not with the way their gazes drop to each other's lips, the blonde's once again caught between her teeth. Not with the way her pulse races, throat tightening. Swallowing, she says, "You're awesome."

Delphine smirks, though Cosima sees the way her eyes have darkened. "I'm the noble one, remember?"

* * *

Her heart doesn't seem to stop pounding until they're on stage, a stadium's worth of faces staring back at her, the bright lights blinding. Even then, there's a near-arresting nervous energy droning in the pit of her stomach, an uncertainty. Her hands tighten over her guitar as Felix adjusts his bass, the drum kit empty behind them.

When they suggested Delphine fill in for the evening, Sarah had been too sick to protest. She seemed wary of the idea – as much as she could muster while lying on the bathroom floor, falling asleep in front of the toilet. However, even she had begrudgingly admitted that if anyone on this tour had the chops to pull it off, it would be Delphine.

" _This is a one-time-only deal,"_ she'd insisted, grabbing Cosima's wrist. Pale as she was, reeking of puke, all of the intimidation had been wiped from her. _"Don't get too cozy, lovebird."_

_Cozy_ isn't the word she'd use to describe this experience though. Her body is completely thrumming as she leans into the microphone, addressing the crowd.

"We're going to be doing things a bit differently tonight," she tells them. "Our drummer, Sarah, is feeling a little under the weather, so we've got a special guest filling in on the kit for her." The crowd begins to buzz, whistling, clapping. "We're totally thrilled tonight to welcome our friend, In Vitro's own Delphine Cormier to the stage."

The audience roars when Delphine makes her entrance, settling down at the kit— _her_ kit—and pulls out her sticks.

"Yeah, keep clapping," Cosima encourages, glancing back at Delphine with a smirk, "she's doing us a real solid tonight." Edging away from the microphone, she gives Felix a nod, silently asking if he's ready. Shrugging, he coyly smirks.

"Ready, Rock Star," he shouts at Delphine, who can only nod, curls bouncing over her shoulders. Securing her grip on the guitar pick, Cosima walks quickly back to the kit.

"All good," she checks, her heart pounding. Delphine kicks the bass drum a couple times, hitting the snare.

"We're going to have fun," she tells Cosima, beaming.

The brunette gives her a thumbs up. "Count us off when you're ready."

She never could've imagined how different it would be, having another drummer behind her. Every percussive nuance steeps the music in a new tone. She can't say it's _better_. In her eyes, Nautilus is and only ever could be Sarah, Felix, and herself. This is _their_ music, together. But with Delphine at her back, it becomes something dissimilar. Something good. As they move fluidly from song to song—with Delphine's cues, her uncannily adroit conformity to their music—it starts to feel like more than _just_ a performance.

Cosima and Delphine never spoke much about the day they planned together, aside from the fact that they'd liked the way that it had sounded, that it had been _easy._ Neither of them questioned the fact that they had been so compatible, so utterly in tune with each other. It wasn't just talent, Cosima had thought. It had been psychic. Now, with Delphine behind a drum kit instead of a synthesizer, nothing has changed.

Halfway through the set, all of Cosima's anxiety has dissolved. She doesn't need to worry about Delphine, doesn't need to keep checking in on her. They play in absolute harmony, each growing bolder as their confidence in each other grows – Cosima's hands flitting over unexpected licks, Delphine rolling into sudden fills.

They're in the middle of one of Nautilus' more melodic pieces when Cosima breaks away from the microphone, walking back to stand in front of Delphine's kit, fingers moving over a familiar phrase. The blonde's body is lit with the purple and blue LEDs Cal has strobing over the stage. She looks up at Cosima, eyes intense, mouth gaping slightly, and watches for her next cue.

Cosima isn't necessarily smiling, though her lips upturn just slightly, eyes peering resolutely into the blonde's. She feels like they're holding a tacit conversation, transmitting their next moves to each other. Above the music, she can hear her own pulse, drumming in time with the kick; can feel the answering gleam in Delphine's eyes, her tiny nod.

Her hand tears down the fret board abruptly, spine bowing as she tilts her head back. Immediately, Delphine hammers on the crash, picking up the tempo as Cosima moves frenetically into a solo. All the while, the brunette can feel Delphine's eyes glued to her, their intensity searing her neck. Her head drops, and she arcs forward over the body of the guitar, swaying, eyes meeting the blonde's once again as the tempo shifts.

Everything is quiet and slow for a moment. Cosima can feel her body trembling, bending notes up on the seventeenth fret. She can see Delphine's chest heaving through a deep breath as she hammers simultaneously on snare and cymbal, a bead of sweat rolling down her temple. Pulling back again, Cosima palms her whammy bar, the end of the solo trilling wildly as Delphine rolls the drums in an impressive fill.

Cosima ends the song feeling breathless, continues to feel so even after they step off the stage, Rachel Duncan intercepting them before they can even reach the green room, before she and Delphine have a moment alone, insisting that Felix and Cosima take Sarah to the nearest urgent care.

"If she needs to be hospitalized, I need to know _now_ —not at 8am tomorrow when we're supposed to be on the road."

"Christ. Can we get a glass of water first, maybe take a piss? We haven't even been off stage for more than a bloody minute," Felix grouses.

"Is she worse," Cosima asks, concerned. She's standing closely to Delphine, fidgeting at the body heat wicking off of her. The blonde's collarbone glistens slightly with sweat. Cosima can barely keep her eyes on the manager.

"She's not any better, is the problem—not in any condition to perform yet. I've checked the hours of the nearest urgent care center. You have—" She checks her watch. "—a little less than an hour to get her there before they close. I suggest you leave immediately."

"Shit," Cosima says, irritated. Duncan has a point, she knows – better to get Sarah checked out now, before they have to leave tomorrow. She'll feel better knowing her friend has seen a doctor anyway. Still, after the charged moments they'd just experienced on stage, she was really hoping to have the time to at least _talk_ to Delphine before In Vitro has to begin their set. "Okay, yeah. We'll make sure she gets there. C'mon, Fee," she grabs his arm, shooting a disappointed looking Delphine an apologetic look. "We didn't tire you out, did we?"

"Hardly," Delphine smiles. "I'm ready for round two."

Cosima grins, blushing slightly. "We'll talk later, okay?"

"Oui," Delphine says gently, watching as Cosima leads Felix begrudgingly away.

* * *

Ultimately, they're able to avoid the ER. A couple hours later, after Sarah has been pumped full of fluids, her fever lowered, Felix and Cosima take her back to the hotel. The drummer doesn't care to be fawned over, but she's feeling weak enough that she doesn't argue when Felix and Cosima start fussing over her.

They settle for squeezing, all three of them, into one of the two queen sized beds in the room, watching a bad sci-fi movie on HBO. Sarah lies between them, curled under the blanket, pressed into Felix's side. They talk sparsely for an hour, having to help Sarah into the bathroom only once before they all begin to doze.

Her bandmates drift into sleep before her, while she vacillates between tuning into the movie and replaying the night's performance in her mind—specifically, the moments she'd stood before Delphine's kit, eyes locked. The intensity lingers, warming her body. However, Sarah and Felix's soft snores, the dimness of the room, eventually overcome her.

Half conscious, she startles when she feels her phone vibrating on her stomach. Blinking through her drowsiness, mind stuttering, she readjusts her crooked glasses and unlocks her phone. It's just past midnight, and there's a message from Delphine on her screen, simply telling her, _"Room 221."_

She sits up, feeling immediately alert. Her heart jolts, certain of the invitation, the unvoiced _"come now"._ Had Delphine wanted her to wait, she would have said so. Dressed only in her lounge clothes – a simple tank top and harem pants – she rushes into the bathroom to check her makeup, quickly brush her teeth. After making sure Sarah and Felix are still soundly asleep, she turns off the bedside lamp and leaves.

Barefooted, she takes the elevator down one floor, and doesn't hesitate to rap her knuckles lightly against Delphine's door. There's a slight shuffling on the other side before it jars open, the blonde smirking down at her.

"Took you long enough," she teases.

"Three minutes," Cosima drawls, rolling her eyes as she steps past Delphine. Once inside, the woman shuts and locks the door behind her. Cosima raises a brow. "Am I not allowed to leave?"

"I assume you know how to work a deadbolt," Delphine tells her cheekily. In the low lamplight, the brunette can see that she looks much like she had Friday evening – face scrubbed free of makeup, hair down and somewhat mussed. There's something oddly nude, oddly confessional about her appearance. Cosima can't help but feel enamored.

After a moment, smiling gently across the few feet of space separating them, Cosima says, "So—we're having a pajama party then."

Delphine bites her lip. "If you want to stay." Cosima could laugh, but the sound gets caught in her throat. She swallows.

If she were feeling any more charming, she might say something like _"If you'll make it worth my while."_ The thought crosses her mind. But all she seems able to muster is a small nod and an ineloquent "Yeah."

"Good." Delphine takes a step closer, leaving just a foot of space between them. "I'm guessing Sarah is okay?"

"It's definitely food poisoning, but, uh… she'll be all right. No hospital."

"I'm glad," Delphine nods, capturing Cosima's gaze. A little more quietly, she says, "If you need me again tomorrow," she reaches forward to play with the hem of the guitarist's shirt, her attention turned down, "just say the word."

The brunette watches her, running her tongue along her bottom lip. The gentleness of Delphine's tone makes her mouth go dry. Her mind flashes again, seeing the way the blonde had gazed at her on stage earlier – so utterly in tune – and she exhales.

"Thank you." She grabs the hand playing with the bottom of her shirt, intertwining their fingers, and ducks her head. "I don't want you to think that I'm exaggerating, or just trying to flatter you, but you were incredible earlier. The whole thing was… Jeez—" She sighs contentedly. "—Any transition I made, it was like you were half a second ahead of me—like you knew exactly what I was thinking. I'd look at you, and there was this total recognition." She pauses. "It was really… I guess _comforting_ is the word."

After a moment, still biting her lip, Delphine tells her, "Analogous, maybe?"

"Yeah…" Cosima watches as a slight wrinkle forms between the blonde's brows. She squeezes her hand a little bit tighter, heart beating quickly. Suddenly, Delphine lifts her gaze, honing in on her with the same quiet intensity she'd been fixed with earlier.

"Cosima—" She starts, but the thought gets tangled in her anxiety.

"What is it," the brunette asks, hand stroking up her forearm, trailing goosebumps.

"It's not like—I don't just feel like that when we're playing. It's _all_ the time. Whenever we seem to look at each other. I can feel it—all over. And it's so—so _good_ , you know? I just—" She stops suddenly, biting her lip again. Before Cosima can even question it, Delphine's mouth is crashing into hers. The brunette allows the surprise to take her for just a beat before she kisses back, one hand grasping behind Delphine's neck as the blonde cups her cheeks, pushes her insistently against the wall.

Her body reacts instantly—set completely aflame—tangling her fingers in Delphine's messy curls. The blonde's tongue probes gently, and Cosima pulls her closer, chests pressing together. Delphine takes the hint, pushing her flush to the wall, and Cosima's mouth wanders, darting swiftly to her neck. The blonde moans as she sucks at her pulse point, scratching with her teeth.

As her right hand travels down Delphine's side, teasing her ribcage through the thin fabric of her shirt, the blonde breathily calls her name. _"Cosima."_

Dizzy, she pulls back, looking up at her. "Yeah?"

"You know I've never—with a woman." Her fingers dig into the base of Cosima's skull, scratching tantalizingly. "But I'm not afraid. I just—" She swallows hard.

"What," Cosima asks, running her thumb along her jaw.

After a moment, Delphine sighs. "I just want you."

Cosima kisses her hard. "I want you, too." One of Delphine's hands moves down to her hip, squeezing, and Cosima rasps, "I _really_ fucking want you. You're not alone in this." She winds her arms around the blonde's back, holding her as they kiss with increasing fervency. Her fingertips trail down Delphine's spine through her shirt, ghosting over the pale skin exposed at the bottom. The blonde shivers. _"Do you want me to touch you,"_ Cosima whispers throatily into her ear.

"Yes," Delphine instantly huffs, her voice quavering.

"C'mon." Cosima leads her to the bed. Slowly, she pulls her tank top over her head, hands moving to the hem of Delphine's shirt. She quirks her brows questioningly, and the blonde nods, breathing deeply as Cosima divests her. She shivers again when Cosima's palms flatten over her stomach, hands grasping her sides while kissing down her neck, across her clavicle. Her lips move to the blonde's shoulder as she gently pulls down her bra straps. "Is this okay," she asks.

"Cosima," Delphine sighs, digging her fingers into her dreads. "You don't have to ask. I—" Her voice hitches as Cosima's mouth moves downwards, the brunette pulling down the cups of her bra to expose her breasts. She takes a deep breath. "Do whatever you want."

Cosima stops suddenly, lifting her head to look up at Delphine. She licks her lips, pushing the blonde delicately back onto the bed. "Whatever I want?"

"Yes," Delphine tells her, gaze trailing hotly down her chest, her stomach. Noticing this, Cosima smiles, removing her own bra, her pants. The blonde bites her lip, breath quickening as she watches. Following her lead, she fully removes her own bra. When her hands move to the button of her jeans, Cosima stops her.

" _I_ want to," she says, eyes dark, watching Delphine as she removes her pants. Her gaze drags up her flushed body. "Nothing in those magazines could compare to this, you know." Taking a deep breath, she leans over Delphine, arms braced. "You're gorgeous," she tells her, body close enough that the blonde can feel the heat of her breath. She kisses feverishly down her throat again, between her breasts, Delphine's chest rising a little higher with each breath.

"Know what I really want," she asks, teasing the sides of Delphine's breasts with feathery kisses. "For you to feel comfortable. But, also—" She takes one of the blonde's nipples into her mouth, grazing lightly with her teeth. Delphine groans. Pulling back her mouth with a pop, blowing a cool breath onto the wet skin, Cosima looks up at her. "—I just want to make you come."

"Moi, aussi," the blonde half moans, half laughs, the sound simultaneously needy and anxious. Cosima returns her attention to her chest, the soft planes of her stomach, as she presses her thigh against Delphine's center.

"I can _feel_ you," she groans into her skin, melting into the blonde's warmth. Impatient, Delphine rucks against her thigh. Kissing back up her neck, Cosima allows her hand to tease at the tops of the drummer's underwear—can feel her hips rise just slightly. Slipping under the waistband, she hovers just over Delphine's mouth, their lips but a hair's breadth from each other. When she enters her, she swallows the blonde's moan, barely able to contain her own.

After setting a slow rhythm, watching Delphine for every minute reaction – the dilation of pupils, the biting of a tongue, the jerk of a breath catching in her chest – Cosima slides her underwear down her hips and changes the angle, pumping faster. Just watching the blonde, suffused in the warm, yellow light, little shadows falling across her body as she wriggles and moans, Cosima can feel her own body working itself to a smolder.

She's nearly lying over Delphine's body, fingers curled, palm brushing flat over her swollen nub when the blonde climaxes, suddenly, her cry choked, high-pitched. Cosima breathes deeply against her chin, sighing with her as she eases the woman down. After several more strokes, each growing more languid, her hand stills.

As she begins to pull out her digits, Delphine grabs her wrist. " _Attendez_ —w-wait," she whispers, stumbling to catch her breath. Cosima obliges her, pushing herself up on a trembling arm to gaze at her more clearly. Her pulse ricochets inside of her chest.

"Are you okay?"

Delphine laughs, reaching up to cup Cosima's cheek, thumb fluttering under her eye. "Oui," she softly says, turning her head to kiss the arm braced next to her. "You're shaking a little bit." Her lips linger over the brunette's forearm. It's such an innocuous place to be kissed, she thinks, but it still makes her stomach clench.

"So are you."

Delphine looks up at her, breath evening, gaze warm. "Get down here." Cosima delicately buries her face in the blonde's neck, inhaling. She can feel Delphine clenching around her fingers again as she exhales.

After a moment of silence, Delphine remarks, "I guess it shouldn't surprise me that you're so good with your hands."

Cosima snorts. "I guess not." She pauses, considering the quiet of the room, of her own mind—the calm of her body, in spite of the fire still roiling low in her belly. "It's better than music," she mumbles into Delphine's neck, unsure if she'll even hear it; but the blonde's arm wraps tightly around her then, as she lays tiny kisses against Cosima's hairline.

"I'm sorry it was so fast," Delphine mutters.

Cosima shakes her head, "We have all night, don't we?" A slow grin curls her lips, and she leans up again, finally removing herself from Delphine as she does so. The blonde's eyes flutter at the loss. Resting on her elbows, Cosima tucks an errant curl behind her ear. "And we'll take it slow." Brushing her nose against Delphine's, she says, "Or not. Whatever we feel like—no pressure."

"Yeah," Delphine asks her, eyes rounded, vulnerable. All at once, Cosima can see in them both the anxiety and the desire to reciprocate.

"Yeah," she assures her, kissing her languorously. When she pulls away, she offers Delphine a crooked smile. "We have to learn each other, don't we?" Wrapping her arms around Cosima's neck, Delphine smiles in return.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, that happened.
> 
> Now, onto Delphine's POV.


	14. Fourteen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The beginning of this chapter does elude to some NSFW content, so if that's not your cup of tea, feel free to skip.

Cosima's eyelashes feel soft beneath her fingertips, like the florets of a dandelion. As Delphine leans over her she can see the brunette's cheeks are flushed, buried into her pillow. She traces her features delicately. It's a relief to touch without reservation what she has, for weeks now, admired only from distances—the ring in her nose; the slope of her windpipe; the divots of her collarbone, now slightly bruised from the attention they received hours before. Carefully, Delphine draws down the rumpled bed sheet to rest at Cosima's belly.

Their bodies are so different. Like most women, she's spent her entire life comparing herself to other girls - it's what she was taught to do, in order to measure her own value, her own beauty. There were so many times she'd looked at another woman, at a classmate or a friend, and thought to herself, _I want that._ _I want to look like that—_ sometimes with a sense of admiration; other times, a sense of envy.

She looks at Cosima's body now and thinks, _I want that, too;_ but she doesn't want to look _like_ Cosima. She wants to look _at_ her. She wants to have her body, possess it in a way warm with affection, with desire. She's admired the bodies of the men in her life, too, in a similar way. This hardly seems comparable though. With past lovers, she'd always felt in control. With Cosima, she doesn't. And she doesn't _want_ to.

Delphine shivers, goosebumps rising along her pale skin. None of the things she presumed would matter last night actually did—not the newness or her inexperience, not her anxiety. Cosima had been indelibly gentle and equally firm. She had been encouraging. Where other lovers had sought to take the lead, the brunette had moved concurrently, so that Delphine didn't _need_ to know what she was doing.

When Cosima had told her, _"You're not alone in this,"_ she'd assumed she meant in her desire, maybe even in her nerves. But now, in the dimness of the room, her body still warmed by a fitful sleep; feeling safe in the tangled sheets, the ramparts of their passion, Delphine understands the weight of her words. She had no need for anxiety—Cosima did not leave her, not in any sense.

She splays her fingertips over Cosima's stomach, dragging them lightly upwards, between her breasts, and draws in light, swirling patterns. Teeth sinking into her lower lip, she traces an index finger around the brunette's nipple. Delphine watches it harden quickly at her ministrations, the heat pooling in her stomach. Cosima did more than just make her feel safe last night. She made her feel like she was on fire.

The other woman stirs. She's smiling sleepily when Delphine regards her, though her eyes remain closed. "G'morning," she says, voice raspy. Delphine grins, leaning over her, hand resting comfortably on Cosima's breast.

"Morning," she replies lightly, kissing the corner of her mouth.

Breathing deep, eyes languorously opening, the brunette asks, "What time is it?"

"Quarter after seven," Delphine answers, glancing at the clock on the bedside table.

"Don't we have to leave at eight?"

"I guess."

Cosima grins lazily, running her hands up Delphine's arms. "You _guess_?"

"I don't think Rachel has the audacity to leave without me."

"Ooh," Cosima purrs teasingly. "I get you naked for one night, and already my terrible influence is rubbing off on you."

"What can I say," Delphine asks, pressing her mouth to Cosima's, tongue gliding over the woman's upper lip. "We did a lot of rubbing last night."

The brunette laughs throatily. "We did, didn't we?" The blonde kisses her jaw, Cosima's eyes fluttering closed. "You're feeling all right this morning?"

"Why wouldn't I be," Delphine asks, lips moving slightly lower.

"Well," Cosima shudders, "maybe—" Delphine silences her, swallowing her doubts. After several seconds of smoldering caresses, she pulls back, gazing affectionately down at the guitarist.

"Almost everything about last night was different than what I would've imagined it to be." She pecks Cosima's lips again, quirking an eyebrow impishly. "Music is not the only thing you're proficient in, it seems."

Cosima chuckles, cupping Delphine's cheeks. "I'm glad you think so," she says quietly. "I really… _really_ wanted you to enjoy last night."

"You didn't think I would?"

Cosima averts her eyes suddenly, appearing embarrassed. "It wouldn't be the first time. I mean—that I was a girl's first, and…" The admission trails off, but Delphine can see, clearly in her avoidant gaze, the meaning of her words.

"I thought that would matter, too—" Delphine tells her quickly. "—that I've never been with a woman before. Honestly though—" The blonde laughs quietly to herself, dropping her gaze. When she lifts her head again, Cosima is watching her carefully, eyes curious and a little vulnerable. Delphine's countenance softens. "I didn't care. You're just… Cosima," she shrugs. "And I think you're wonderful. Everything else seems unimportant."

Cosima gazes at her, eyes equally intense, before capturing her lips in a sudden, searing kiss. Delphine melts into it, just as eager. The heat of the night prior seems to pick up exactly where it left off, without preamble. She sighs.

"I hope it was obvious," Cosima pants, pulling away slightly, "last night—how wonderful I think _you_ are."

"Probably," Delphine whispers into her open mouth. "But I think these things bear repeating, non?"

"Mmm," Cosima hums, nuzzling her nose, tongue sweeping across the blonde's bottom lip. "If I agree, we might be late."

Delphine laughs, the dulcet sound tapering off into a growl. "Do you think I care?"

"I think one of us—" She hisses slightly as Delphine's hand slides down her breast, tickling her abdomen. "—should _probably_ care."

"Cosima—" She grinds against her. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she is surprised be her own forwardness, the demand of her body. "— _fuck the tour._ " Cosima's mouth parts slightly, and she seizes the moment with her tongue. "We have more important matters to attend to."

* * *

After some thorough castigation from Rachel, Delphine spends almost the entirety of the few hours' drive to Ohio in her bunk, curtain closed, texting Cosima. She feels like a teen—giddy, buoyant, resentful of every moment they spend apart. She wonders if maybe she should be embarrassed. However, from the way Cosima lingered at her side before they left, pecking her lips with repeated "see you later"s as Felix and Sarah groaned exasperatedly from the van, she'd guess she's not the only one feeling a little clingy.

Cosima texts her every song on Nautilus' daily playlist and Delphine replies with selfies, snippets from the book she's reading. Her body feels heavy with exhaustion, having barely slept the night before – having barely slept for the past few nights, she realizes – but every time her eyelids seem to droop, her phone vibrates with a new message, and she snaps into alertness, not bothering with some coy delay between texts.

She's halfway through composing her next reply when her bunk curtain slides open abruptly, startling the phone out of her grip. Crouching down with a sly grin, Beth pokes her head in.

"The boys are in the back playing Call of Duty. Move over. We've got lots to talk about."

Delphine's mouth gapes open slightly, but she makes room, nevertheless. "Can the two of us even fit in one of these?"

"Yes," Beth answers certainly, lying down next to her. Craning her head, she smirks. "Paul and I sleep together sometimes."

"We're all quite aware," Delphine sarcastically replies. Beth flicks her forehead. "Very mature."

"You have no right to judge."

"I don't?"

Turning to face her, deadpanned, Beth simply states, "You had sex with Cosima last night."

Delphine matches her cool gaze. She won't deny it – gossip travels fast on tour. She does feel somewhat indignant, however, at the speed with which this particular piece of information has travelled.

"How is it that you and Paul managed to hide it for three whole weeks while sharing a bus with us, and Cosima and I can't keep it to ourselves for _one night_ —in the privacy of a hotel room?"

Beth shrugs. "Felix and Sarah knew the moment they woke up this morning exactly what Cos had been up to. Five minutes of interrogation in the van and she cracked."

"And they texted you," Delphine asks dryly, unable to muster the proper annoyance.

"We may have had a bet." She pauses, glancing slowly at her bandmate. "And I may have won."

"You're all assholes," Delphine chuckles, covering her face.

"You have your girlfriend to blame. She's a bit too demonstrative for secrecy."

Delphine stiffens suddenly, surprised. She removes her hands from her face and stares inquisitively at Beth. "My _girlfriend_?"

She raises a brow. "Well, unless you're not into labels. But isn't that kind of a formality anyway?"

"We haven't talked about it."

Beth rolls her eyes. "Do you really need to?"

"I don't know," Delphine answers honestly. Then, after a pause, "But I don't think we do. And I like that."

"Huh. I expected you to try and complicate things, Del. If I'm being honest." Beth pushes herself up on her elbow, catching the drummer scowling slightly, without bite. "Should I assume the sex was good?"

Delphine's face reddens, but she smiles. "It was, uh…" Thinking of just _how_ good it was, she finds herself unable to finish her answer. Instead, she simply nods. Beth laughs.

"At a loss for words. That _is_ good." Delphine nods again, self-satisfied. "Was it different?"

"Sure—not that I thought about it at the time. But a lot of the big differences—they were…" She trails off again, biting her lip.

"Oh, boy. Don't say _emotional_ ," Beth teases. Delphine sighs, blushing more deeply. The bassist shoves her playfully. "Shit, Del. You might be in trouble." Beth means it as a joke, but the implications weigh heavily on Delphine nevertheless. She has enough of a sense of decorum to know when it is acceptable to tell someone _exactly_ how you feel. After yesterday – everything about it – the sweetness of their trip to the zoo; the electricity of playing together; the tenderness, the intensity of their sex – Delphine has no doubts. It would be untoward to admit it just yet, but she still wants to.

Shaking off her anxiety, she abruptly says, "There was more to grab onto. That was the biggest difference."

Beth laughs. "More handholds."

"I liked it."

"Obviously." Beth chuckles again, gaze turning impish. "The _real_ question though—was she better than your ex?"

Delphine forces herself to sober somewhat. "It's a little soon, don't you think?"

"To ask," the bassist wonders incredulously. "You're the one who did the deed already."

After a moment, glowering, Delphine concedes with a smirk. "I guess you're right." Considering this, she diplomatically replies, "Sex with Mark hadn't been good for at least the last six months. It doesn't seem fair to compare them." More quietly, she adds, "It wasn't all him though. I wasn't very into it towards the end."

"Takes two, remember? I'd say that's a pretty good answer in itself."

"Probably," she shrugs. Feeling her phone vibrate against her hip, she picks it up, discreetly checking the message. Beth, of course, doesn't hesitate to snatch it from her hand. "C'mon—"

"You _had_ to have known that would happen," Beth replies, reading the text. After a moment, she shakes her head. "Goddamnit," she says, her tone weary.

Delphine perks up, made nervous by this reaction. "What?" Beth holds the phone in front of her face. Her expression softens, then immediately warms as her eyes scan the text – a selfie of Cosima lying in the back of the van, smiling exaggeratedly, attached to the message, _"Can't wait to get out of this van. Kind of miss you already…"_

"I just realized we're all going to have to deal with your incessant sap-fest for the rest of the tour." Delphine steals back the phone, forcing herself to set it aside in the name of preserving her dignity. "You're not _just_ in trouble, Cormier," Beth sighs. "You're totally fucked."

* * *

It's hard for Delphine not to whisk Cosima away to the van or the bus – anywhere private – once they're settled in at the arena, though admittedly the ribbing isn't as bad as she'd thought it would be. Beth had relieved herself of most of her teasing on the bus earlier. The urge is clearly stoked in her again in the presence of Felix and Sarah, but with the other drummer still too weak to land a proper barb, the mischief tapers off quickly.

Delphine has been asked to play with Nautilus for a second night, much to Sarah's displeasure. She insists that she's able, but with the medicine still working through her, her body is entirely drained. Felix and Cosima both send her back to bed, provoking her ire with their concern.

Delphine is surprised when, before leaving in a huff, Sarah grabs her by the arm and concedes, "It's not you, Cormier, all right? Just feels weird to have someone stepping in on me."

"I promise, I'm not—"

"I know, I know," Sarah waves her off. "You've got your own band. I still hate having to sit out a show though." Oddly enough, she can sense some trust in Sarah's resignation. Perhaps even a bit of approval. It makes her feel relieved.

Eventually, their bandmates leave them alone in the green room. The desire to lay Cosima out on the couch immediately is strong, but with the lack of privacy, Rachel Duncan overbearingly prowling the halls, Delphine restrains herself. There will be time later, she knows. Instead, spying Art and Paul's acoustic guitar cases left on the floor in the corner, she walks over and pops the locks.

"I've been wondering something," she tells Cosima.

"Yeah?" The brunette comes to stand behind her. Delphine can feel her presence, her slight grin. "What's that?"

"Do you ever play acoustic? You never use one on stage."

Cosima shrugs. "Sure. Rarely on the albums though, and almost never on stage. I mostly use mine when I'm writing." Delphine pulls Art's guitar from the case – a well-lacquered Martin with barely a single nick on the body – and sits cross-legged on the carpet. The instrument is larger than she's used to, and rests awkwardly in her lap. "Can you play," Cosima asks, sitting opposite her.

"Mhm," Delphine hums, concentrating around a simple chord progression. "The technical aspects transfer easily from piano." Her poorly formed barre chord twangs hollowly and she cringes. "I'm not nearly as used to the feel of a guitar though."

"That one's a little big. I have an old parlor acoustic. It's tiny."

"Fitting." Delphine smiles, her hands becoming more familiar with the progression. Suddenly, she looks up at Cosima. "How about you teach me to play one of your songs?" The brunette watches her for a moment, expression soft, somewhat excited.

"Okay," she agrees, narrowing her gaze slightly. "Let me just think of one…" She pauses, readjusting her glasses. "Ahh—okay. I've got a really easy one. Not that I think you _need_ an easy one—"

Delphine chuckles. "I probably do."

"Okay, well—" Cosima slides forward so that her knees are pressed to Delphine's. She then gently takes the blonde's left hand in her own, and slides it down the neck of the guitar. "First, barre the last four strings on the eighth fret. Pinky on the eleventh fret, e string. Pick each note—like this—" Reaching forward with her thumb, Cosima shows her the simple pick pattern, which Delphine immediately mimics – a little clumsy at first, but she easily gets the hang of it. "Perfect. Through the verse you'll pick that once, then take your pinky off. Put your ring finger on the tenth fret, D string. Pick in the same pattern, except hammer onto the ninth fret, B string, for the last note." Delphine follows her instructions, allowing the brunette to guide her the first few times. "There—you've got it. The chorus is just three other chords. That's basically the whole song, except when I play it, I layer about four other harmonies on top of it."

The blonde adjusts easily to the pick pattern, the simple progression. "It's simple," she tells her. "Pretty."

"It's _old._ But I've always liked it."

"How old?"

"I wrote it when—" She thinks on it for a second before letting out a breath. "I think I was a junior in high school."

"That is pretty old," Delphine agrees. After a few more moments, playing the pattern easily, she quietly entreats, "You have to sing it, too—to teach me."

Cosima places a hand on the blonde's knee, tapping. "Do I?"

"Absolutely."

"I don't know if I want to," she says, laughing through a sudden blush.

"Why not," Delphine asks teasingly, her hands stilling over the strings.

"Because I wrote it when I was seventeen."

"And you think that makes it bad?"

After a moment, Cosima answers, her tone almost embarrassed, "I think that makes it… about things that don't matter anymore."

That, Delphine can understand. It does make her curious, however. Lightening her tone, she grins, "Did you write it about someone special?"

"No," Cosima admits, laughing. Finally, she meets Delphine's gaze. "Not really. I didn't have anyone special to write about then. But I kind of… hoped that I would. And, because I _was_ seventeen, I had all these elaborate ideas about what that person would be like, how _we_ might be together. How it would feel. That's what this song is about—just an idea."

"Oh." Delphine pauses, leaning over the body of the guitar, close to Cosima's mouth. Cosima, who is suddenly so shy. Her bashfulness only seems to draw the blonde to her. "And here I thought you never wrote love songs."

"I hadn't," she tells her. "I just thought I did."

"But now," Delphine asks, unthinking.

"What about now?" Suddenly, the blonde feels a bit shy herself. _It's too soon for those kinds of questions_ , she reminds herself, as Cosima's eyes fall distractedly to her own lap, playing with the rings on her fingers.

After a pause, Delphine clears her throat. "You're not going to sing for me, are you?"

Grinning archly once again, Cosima meets her gaze, teeth showing. "What do you think I've been doing every night?"

Delphine matches her countenance. "If you're looking to flatter, you'll have to do better than that."

"Are you so used to me already that my debonair one-liners no longer work on you," she asks with exaggerated haughtiness.

"They work just fine. All that put-on smarminess is so weak it's actually charming."

"Shit. You're mean, Cormier." Leaning forward, holding her lips just half an inch from Delphine's, Cosima smirks. "I kind of like it." Feeling unable to help herself, the blonde presses forward to close the gap, eyes fluttering shut. Cosima pulls away at the last second though, chuckling.

"You want to play games now?"

"Maybe," Cosima answers, stifling her chuckles. As they die down, her smile softens. "How about a trade."

"A trade of what," Delphine asks, one eyebrow raised slightly. The brunette chuckles again.

"How easily distracted you are." Plucking her thumb lightly down the strings of the guitar again, she tells her, "If you want me to sing you that song, I will. As it turns out, I'm not a big fan of denying you. Which reminds me—" Leaning forward, Cosima captures her lips in a quick kiss, pulling back all too soon. Delphine rolls her eyes, feeling a little frustrated with herself _._ She's never known someone who could so frequently catch her off guard the way Cosima seems to. "But I think it's only fair for you to sing me a song, too," Cosima continues, smiling lightly.

"Any song?"

"Any one of _your_ songs."

"I see," Delphine concedes. "That _does_ seem fair…"

"But," Cosima asks cautiously, leaning over the blonde's lap, her bright eyes fringed in curiosity. Delphine smiles shyly. As jaded as she may sometimes behave, there's a sense of wonder in the brunette that never seems to leave. It warms Delphine to know that she's an obvious source of fascination for Cosima.

Still, she's not used to sharing her music with others. It seems so personal to her, so intimate. She'd shared many things with Mark – thoughts and fears – but she'd kept her compositions to herself. As far as he was concerned, In Vitro _was_ her music. He'd been satisfied just listening to their records.

Cosima has already shared so much with her though. Their little jam session, moments spent listening to records in the back of the van. In those wordless, ruminant instances, steeped in pot-smoke, they had revealed so much to each other. Last night—they had revealed everything.

It was before they removed each other's clothing, before they moved over and under each in the hotel room, panting, pinning a name to their desires in single-word pleas. When they were on stage together, Cosima standing before her drum kit, body pulsating with nebulous energy, she had appeared naked—not as an object. Not for the audience at all. When their eyes had met, Delphine knew that it had been for her—a little more than salacious, just short of psychic. The blonde had never witnessed another person so divested of their own self.

All people have a manner of speaking, of conducting themselves in the company of others. They have gestures and principles. A self-imposed persona – perhaps the person one most desires themselves to be, or otherwise the only person they believe they are capable of being. In increments, Delphine felt as if they'd shed themselves of that—under the stage lights, the music surging; in her hotel room. Inside of each other.

_What are the odds that I'm overthinking all of this,_ she wonders. _Do I care?_ Delphine considers what she said to Cosima in the green room the other day, about the difference between poets and pragmatists. She'd always considered herself to be the latter, but her every thought about the brunette seems to contradict that assumption.

_I don't care,_ she thinks. And in the same instance, says, "No buts. I want to trade."

Cosima seems somewhat surprised by this, enthusiastic. "Really?" Delphine nods, smiling. "Rad. I totally thought I'd, like, have to twist your arm a bit before you agreed."

"Under normal circumstances, yes. You most certainly would."

"And these circumstances are _ab_ normal?"

Delphine chuckles. "Nothing about the past few weeks has been normal for me." Cosima's eyebrows raise, a hint of anxiety passing through her eyes. The blonde places a hand on her forearm, assuring her, "Which is really good. Because—I've discovered—my normal was surprisingly boring."

"I'm glad you think so," Cosima chuckles nervously, her voice growing quieter, softer. "I realize a lot has changed in a short time. I kind of wondered if—I don't know. It might seem that I barged into your life like a bull in a china shop—like I just came in and fucked shit up."

"Bull in a china shop, hmm?" Cosima shrugs. "Maybe. But I invited you in. And all that shit… it needed some fucking up _._ "

Pausing, a bit uncertain, the brunette timidly asks. "Yeah?"

"Oui." Delphine moves her hand to Cosima's neck, thumb stroking lightly below her ear.

"Okay," she concedes, appeased. "Then a trade it is. I'll even go first—in the spirit of fairness."

"Right now?"

"Now? Am I supposed to?"

Delphine laughs, cupping her cheek. "I don't know. You're the one who proposed this trade."

"Yeah—good point. Well, uh… how about _not_ right now? I can play it how it's supposed to be played, with all the effects—all the bells and whistles, you know?"

"If you'd prefer."

Cosima nods. "I would, yeah."

"Okay," Delphine agrees. "When?"

"Patience," Cosima chuckles. "Soon. It's been a while. I might want to practice it once or twice first. Again—it's only fair."

"Right," Delphine nods, leaning forward. "Fair."

"But, you know," Cosima smirks, ducking her head slightly. "In the meantime, I might need a bit of inspiration."

"That so?"

"Definitely," Cosima nods dramatically.

"Well, in _that_ case—"

"Delphine." They both snap to attention as Beth stands in the doorway, wearing a particularly staid expression.

" _Good god,"_ Cosima mutters under her breath, _"again with the interruptions."_

Delphine is inclined to agree, but she's well aware that a neutral Beth is not a Beth bearing particularly good news. The bassist's stoicism immediately sets her on edge.

"What?"

Beth's tone is laconic when she says, "I think you need to come with me," glancing once at Cosima, almost apologetically.

"Why?"

"Damage control, okay?" When the blonde makes no move to follow her yet, pulse suddenly quickening, Beth's expression falls with a sigh. Delphine is relieved to see that instead of being outright somber or angry, she merely appears frustrated. Waving the blonde forward she tells her, "Just trust me—we take care of this now, we may be able to avoid one of Duncan's shit-fits."

"Oh… okay," Delphine agrees warily, rising to join her bandmate. When Cosima makes a move, as if to follow, Beth waves her away, dryly chuckling. "Uh-uh. _You_ need to trust me, too. Hang tight." When Delphine glances back at the guitarist, Beth grabs her by the arm, gently ushering her from the room. "No worries—I'll have her back for you in one piece."

Delphine is out of the room before Cosima has a chance to reply, Beth steering her insistently away. "What's going on," she asks, forcing her aggravation to mask her mounting anxiety.

When her friend smirks at her, it is equal parts irony and commiseration. "How much excitement do you think you can handle in one day?"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're celebrating the holiday tomorrow, I hope you have an awesome Christmas! If not, have a great day off : )


	15. Fifteen

"Okay, well… I'll just…" Beth allows the statement to trail off, gesturing vaguely towards the door with her thumb. With a blank expression, Delphine turns to her, jaw set rigidly, feeling an irrational sense of betrayal. _"Excitement,"_ Beth had said. Even knowing she had meant it sarcastically, the blonde feels somehow insulted by the levity. "—Yeah," the bassist finishes lamely, placing a hand on Delphine's shoulder before taking her leave.

She stares back at the open door for a moment before turning to face her visitor. In spite of the surge of anxiety roiling in her stomach, she forces herself to appear composed, confident. On one hand, she does have some sense of surety in her stance here. On the other, she has only a sense of guilt.

"You don't think you should shut the door," Mark asks her, eyes narrowed in obvious suspicion. She feels mildly indignant before realizing that his distrust is as forced as her confidence. The tightness of his hands, held stiffly at his sides, belies his hurt.

"Is it going to be one of those conversations," she asks, a note of weariness in her voice.

Mark sighs. "A _private_ conversation? Yes." After a moment's pause, he adds. "Do you think I'm going to yell?"

Delphine shuffles from foot to foot. "You'd… have the right to," she concedes. With a tired, laconic chuckle, Mark shakes his head, striding quickly past her to shut the door himself. She takes a deep breath as she hears it click shut.

"One of the things you always liked about me, Del," he continues quietly, walking towards the couch near the far wall of the dressing room—maintaining a wide berth, she notices, "is that I was never one for my raising my voice." He takes a seat, sinking tiredly into couch with his hands splayed in his lap. He looks down at them, flexing his fingers. "How many times do you suppose I did, over the last two years?"

After twenty seconds of pregnant silence, she realizes the question is not rhetorical. "I don't know," she sputters. "Once or twice, maybe."

He nods, meeting her gaze again. "That was one thing I was good for, right?"

The sudden resentment in his tone makes her flush. "Mark—"

"And, you know," he chuckles again, speaking over her – the sound sadder, "I'd always thought you were just… a little sensitive, a little quiet. Maybe your dad used to yell—maybe it made you uncomfortable. But that wasn't really the case at all." He pauses, glancing at her, and for the first time – since she's know him, really – she can sense true animosity in his tone. "I think—now—you just didn't really want to put in the effort, did you?" The guilt pushes against Delphine's ribs, constricting her next breath. Simultaneously, the indolence rears in her.

"What are you doing here?"

Mark stands again, leisurely, lacking the sense of aggression she'd detected in him just a moment before. Perhaps that had been put on, too. The lethargy of his movements seems incongruous.

"Delphine—" He begins, skeptical. "I was working a shoot Saturday, and you called me out of the blue to _break up with me_?"

She's thrown off kilter by the question, his need for validation. Swallowing, she lamely tells him, "I didn't know you were working."

Confusion passes through his eyes, followed closely by disbelief. "That's not the point." Embarrassed, she runs a hand through her hair, and takes a seat in the armchair diagonal from the couch. Mark doesn't sit. "Ending it over the phone—" He shakes his head. "You knew how tactless that was."

"When were we going to see each other?"

"I don't know," Mark exclaims, throwing his hands in the air. "I rearranged a week's worth of shoots to get out here today. Had I know things were so bad—had I had any indication—"

" _Any indication_?" Delphine's voice begins to crack. "We were on a break."

"For all of five minutes, sure," he scoffs. "I mean—Christ. What the hell happened, Delphine? We went from being _fine_ to _on-a-break_ to _broken-up_ in the blink of an eye." She places her hand over her mouth, biting her tongue, and stares at the wall. "What's going on with you?" A trace of deception colors his accusation, setting her on edge. Her gaze snaps up to meet his, brow furrowing.

"I'm _not_ confused," she adamantly tells him, unsure if the answer is warranted. "Why are you _really_ here?" He meets her blank stare, unwavering.

After a moment, he explains, "Because I'm in love with you."

Her eyes burn. "I know," she tells him.

"It might be easy for you to just… let me go. But I _can't_ do that." Back straightening, he clears his throat. "That's _not_ what you're supposed to do."

"So what _do_ you do," she asks, voice wet. She stubbornly wipes away a tear before it can escape her eye. "Keep holding on until you feel nothing at all? Even better—until you hate the other person?" Mark averts his eyes, squaring his jaw. "I told you—and I'm so sorry—I just… I _fell out of love._ What can I do? I _can't_ change how I feel. And I can't stick around and pretend to feel something I don't. Is that what you want?"

After a long pause, Mark falls back into the couch, the fire seeming to burn out in him. "I just… I don't get it. I don't get how you could seem so _happy_ —to me."

"Confirmation bias," she says quietly, running her hand through her hair again. "We see what we need to see, when it suits us."

"Right," his brows lift, and Delphine watches as his gaze falls to his lap. After a moment, hands balling into fists, he pulls his phone out his pocket. "Just—be honest with me then, okay?"

"I owe you that."

"You know Maddie and I are friends."

Delphine stiffens unconsciously at the reporter's mention. "I know."

"I've been… talking with her about this stuff."

"You have?"

He seems indignant for a moment. "Beth clearly knew. Why shouldn't I be able to talk to someone?"

"I wasn't saying—" She stops, takes a deep breath. "You should. I'm just surprised that someone is Madison."

He scrutinizes her carefully, seeming to derive some satisfaction from her surprise. "We've been working together a lot lately—at the magazine."

"Okay."

"Well—" He scrolls through his phone. "She sent me this link yesterday. And I saw what I needed to see, when it suited me…" Looking back up at her, his expression vague, yet clearly hurt, he concludes, "but I don't suppose it does anymore." He holds out the phone for her, and she takes it tentatively from his grasp. "So, tell me— _is_ that you?"

Lit up on the screen is a tumblr post – a grainy photoset of two figures sat atop a van, vaguely illuminated by lamplight. It's difficult to tell if the two people are embracing in the photo, or something more. It's difficult to tell who exactly they might be. But the caption— _sorry for the quality, but i managed to sneak these after the in vitro show last night. i'm pretty sure that's delphine with cosima niehaus (aka nautilus)?! uhmm, not sure if they're dating or something, but i totally ship it_ —suggests otherwise. There are nearly 16,000 notes.

Delphine's heart seizes for a moment, Rachel's barb about discretion ringing in her ears.

"It is," he says quietly, sounding betrayed.

"Mark—" She stares down at the photos, throat tight. Why did she think something like this _wouldn't_ happen? Try as she might to deny it, to debate the semantics of it, she _is_ a rock star. Fans, press—this is just the kind of relationship they'd eat up—not just for the star-crossed musicians element, but for the fact that they're both women. Gender may not have mattered in the confines of a hotel room, between she and Cosima, but it's just the kind of thing the magazines salivate over.

"I really didn't think you were capable of cheating," he says, reaching for his phone.

Her eyes snap up, wide. "I didn't—"

He takes his phone roughly and stands. "Don't lie to me. It's just insulting."

"We were _already_ broken up, Mark—I swear."

"For how long?" He's shouting now. Delphine flinches. "Five minutes? You think that makes a difference?" He paces to the other side of the room. "You were thinking about it, before we broke up. You were—" He clenches his eyes shut angrily, hands running through his short hair. "God—when I came to visit? I thought something was off. It was... her—already."

Delphine breathes quietly for a few moments, willing her heart rate to even out. All she can offer him is the truth. "It was sudden."

He scoffs. "How long have you _known_ her?"

"I told you when we met—"

"And you told the _truth_?"

"Yes," She stands, exasperated.

"Fucking perfect. I put two years into this. I was _devoted._ And you just throw it all away for some art-rock hipster who plays pretty songs. A _woman_ , no less. Great timing, by the way. Why couldn't you have gotten the experimentation out of your system five years ago like a normal person?"

"This isn't just some experiment—"

"I don't care," he says, throwing his hands up in defeat. "Really—I don't. But, seriously, do not patronize me, Delphine. I can't take it."

Crossing her arms over her chest, she takes a deep breath, traces of indignation, shame, and anxiety mingling within her. Her stomach begins to twist painfully.

After several long moments, she breathes out. "I'm sorry. I hope you believe that." Finally, Mark meets her eyes again, brow furrowed. He opens his mouth once, as if to speak, but quickly shuts it again. Another moment, and he shakes his head, sighing.

"I don't want to. But I do." Hesitating, he walks to the door, and places his hand on the knob. Without looking back, he laughs dryly, telling her, "She better be worth it."

He leaves her without time for response, standing in the center of the room staring at the door.

* * *

"I haven't spent much time in New York City," Cosima comments offhandedly, eyes scanning the corridor. For the past ten minutes, she and Beth have taken to walking aimlessly about the stadium – the bassist's suggestion – as a means of distraction. When Cosima had asked her who Delphine was talking to, she hadn't lied. The answer had instantly tied the guitarist's stomach in knots.

On one hand, she _did_ feel threatened by the photographer's presence, much to her own displeasure. For the most part though, she worried for Delphine—didn't relish the idea of seeing her upset, even if it meant Mark would be far away.

Of course, in the back of her mind, there did exist the worry that this conversation could conclude with Mark _staying_. She tried to dismiss that thought the best she could.

"Have you guys played any shows there?"

"A few," Cosima shrugs. "We've played in Philly about ten times though."

"How did you manage that?" They round one corner, Cosima peering over her shoulder.

"My cousin lives there. He's got a band. We've gigged with them a few times."

"Ahh, so you can show us all the hotspots?"

"Sure."

"And the best place to get a cheesesteak—Pat's or Gino's?"

"Neither," Cosima waves her off distractedly. "My cousin swears by Joe's on Torresdale Avenue. I think it all tastes like shit though."

Beth laughs. "All right. I'll keep that in mind then—" She's cut off as they round another corner, simply walking in circles—nearly colliding with—"Mark," Beth exclaims suddenly, throwing her hands up in front of her.

The photographer's eyes fall on her for only a second before rounding on the woman standing next to her. Reflexively, Cosima takes half a step back, body stiffening. It is a moment too late that she realizes exactly how telling this motion is.

"Hey, uh…" Beth continues awkwardly, vying for his attention, though his gaze is glued to Cosima's. "Where are you headed?"

The guitarist is smart enough to know that he knows. If he didn't, he would have the manners to acknowledge Beth, to tear his gaze away from Cosima. His jaw wouldn't be so tight, a line knit between his brows.

To compensate for Cosima's step back, Beth shifts forward, shoulder blocking her. She smiles slightly, sympathetically. She's not a fool either, not patronizing enough to pretend she doesn't see what he does.

"Need some help finding the exit," she asks, voice amenable, but still firm around the edges.

"I'm good, thanks," he answers, glancing at her out of the corner of his eyes.

"No problem."

After another moment, the man's glower breaks, and he straightens his posture. The intensity, however, remains. With unnerving quietude he glances at Beth, smiling genially, and says, "Take care, Beth. I'll see you around." While Cosima is trying to decipher the meaning of this farewell—forced civility, or veiled promise—he turns to the guitarist, smile broadening, and claps her on the shoulder. "You, too, Cosima. Try not to fuck up." With that, he walks away, Beth and Cosima watching him over their shoulders, eyes wide.

After a long beat of silence, Beth whistles slowly, turning to Cosima. "Shit."

The guitarist takes her time. If this were anybody else, any other relationship, she could laugh. Instead, all she can say is, "I think you should go check on Delphine."

"Me? It might be better if you—"

"There's something I've gotta do. Just… tell her to meet Felix and I for sound-check in two and a half hours, okay?"

Beth measures her quizzically. "I guess? Why are you—"

"Thanks, Beth," Cosima says quickly, squeezing her forearm before hurrying around the opposite corner.

* * *

Sitting behind her kit, Delphine feels more at ease than she has in hours. Granted, there's still some sense of excitement, a ceaseless buzzing in her limbs at backing Cosima on stage, but she finds the proximity to be more pacifying than nerve-wracking.

They don't play with the same closeness they had the night before. That's not to say that they don't play just as well, that Cosima doesn't side-eye her or smirk teasingly over her shoulder between songs; but she doesn't make herself at home in front of the blonde's kick drum either, much to her disappointment.

She'd wanted to be alone after Mark left. The idea that somewhere on the internet people were already speculating, gushing over pictures of her and Cosima left her reeling. On some level it felt entirely invasive. Whatever they were in right now— _together_ —it was still so new, so undeveloped. With past lovers she'd had the privilege of ruminating over their affections for weeks, allowing herself to mold and shape the trajectory of it all before sharing it with others. To her that had always seemed essential. Would she have that luxury now—now that she was on magazine covers, now that her name was on a platinum record?

She feels herself losing the beat as Cosima makes one of her sudden transitions, the lights overly bright. A bead of sweat rolls down her temple, and she squints into the glare, recovering from her almost-blunder with an impromptu fill, urging Cosima into the song's conclusion.

She _had_ wanted to be alone, up until the point when Beth came in to "check on her". Up until the point where she realized how impulsively she'd expected Cosima's presence, and just how difficult it was to quell her disappointment upon seeing the bassist's overly cavalier face instead.

" _We_ sort of _ran into Mark,"_ she'd told Delphine, taking sudden, suspicious interest in a pull in her sweater sleeve. _"And by sort of, I mean we almost literally ran into each while he was rushing out with his tail between his legs."_ She'd smirked in that shameful, you're-not-going-to-like-this, very _Beth_ way of hers, and then finished, _"Not before making some passive-aggressive remarks, of course."_

" _Who—you or him?"_

" _Trust me, I have no interest in agitating the situation,"_ Beth had assured her, hands in her pockets. Her mind raced immediately. Had he said something to Cosima? About her—about them? She'd plied Beth for information, but the bassist kept telling her not to worry. _"He was just trying to intimidate her. She seemed fine though."_

" _Then where is she?"_ Beth had only shrugged, meeting her gaze innocently.

Cosima hadn't made mention of their exchange—of Delphine's exchange—during sound-check, or in the moments leading up to the show. She'd held the blonde's hand, smiled at her gently, but had been unusually quiet. Anxious, even. Felix was ushering them towards the stage before she'd had the chance to call her out on it.

She hits the crash cymbal as Cosima strums her final chord in time with Felix. The crowd roars. They're an excellent audience—rowdy, but erring on the side of ecstatic, as opposed to aggressive; attentive, mouthing along to Cosima's voice. As the din settles, Cosima kneels, guitar at her hip, and begins adjusting her pedals. Delphine glances at Felix questioningly. He smiles and shouts at her, his words indecipherable over the crowd; but as his fingers begin plucking an easy, poppy melody, she understands his meaning— _"Play with me."_

They settle into their improvised rhythm, picking up the tempo as Cosima puts the finishing touches on her board and stands, looking over her shoulder with a raised brow. She chuckles, the sound washed out in the audience's buzz, and turns to address them.

"You guys have been really awesome tonight, you know?" They roar again, goaded by Cosima's voice. "As always, we feel privileged to be able to warm you guys up for our friends, In Vitro—" She waits for the hollering to settle before she continues, "and would like to thank them for this opportunity. They're really rad—all of them. You better scream like hell when they get up here." Delphine smiles, leaning slightly to the right to catch sight of the guitarist's profile. The curve of her smile, from this angle, is so soft, fringed with the white lights. _She's so good at this_ , she thinks.

"Also, once again, Felix and I really have to thank Delphine—" She turns and grins, eyes crinkled around the edges in a way that makes the blonde blush. When she continues, she's still looking at her out of the corner of her eye. "Total life-saver. And, like, super talented." After a moment's pause, readjusting her guitar strap, she says, "Usually now, we'd go into the final song of our set. But—I was wondering—would you guys mind if I played a bonus for you?" They scream again. "Okay—totally taking that as a _yes._ "

The guitarist glances back at Felix, who then grins and glances at Delphine. Waving a mollifying hand, he mouths, _"Just go with it."_

"So, anyway, this is… well, it's an old song. _Really_ old. And I'm probably going to fuck it up, so go easy on me if I do, okay?" The audience cheers once again, Cosima stepping on one of her pedals as she settles her hands on the guitar. Before she begins, she looks back at Felix once and nods. Then, a bit more slowly, she looks at Delphine and smiles, the expression so sweet and suddenly _exposed_ that the blonde's throat seems to constrict.

Her chest tightens, breath catching as Cosima plucks the song's first two chords, fingers picking in the same descending pattern she'd taught Delphine only hours before. She feels torn between a grin and a dumb, surprised gawp at the mellifluous harmony drifting through the stadium.

Cosima plays the chord progression twice before stepping on the looper. It's a slow, layered build. She plays two separate parts over the original melody, Felix's simple bassline accompanying the third guitar. She pauses for a beat after the third harmony concludes, glancing out of the corner of her eye at Delphine before she slouches nervously over the microphone.

The instrumentals are mellow, fluid, and Cosima's voice is even more delicate, soaked in reverb and echoing throughout the stadium. The words surround Delphine—seem to fold over and around her, much in the same way she'd felt the brunette's body do so just the night before. She feels cocooned by her, protected. And, closing her eyes, wading through the promises of a song written close to a decade ago, she feels as if the words were made for her.

About a minute and a half in, realizing how much of a fool she must seem sitting at her kit, clutching her drumsticks and simply _gaping_ , Delphine begins drumming along. It's a simple rhythm, but when Cosima feels it, her posture immediately straightens, and Delphine can see the traces of a smile hitching the edges of her cheeks.

After the third chorus, Cosima steps on the looper once again, allowing her first three harmonies to repeat, and breaks into a slow, tinkling solo. As she does so, she backs away from the microphone, turning around and approaching Delphine with a swaying gait. The blonde isn't sure if she means to be playful, sexy, or just plain sweet; but the combination of the music, the darkness of the brunette's eyes, and the undulation of her hips makes the drummer's stomach somersault, nonetheless.

It's so different than it was the night before, when they'd not yet experienced each other's bodies. The way they'd gazed at each other then, Delphine drumming frenetically, Cosima's hands flittering along the neck of the guitar, had lit a fire under her. This, however, is not immolation. This is slower. She has to imagine nothing. She's now felt those hips rolling into hers, felt the deftness of those fingers. The music, the lock of their eyes, simply crests over her warmly, like a tide. As the song peaks, the final notes echoing, she can feel the undertow drawing her out.

By the time they've finished, her breaths are heaving, the tightness in the pit of her stomach making her feel as if she will snap. The crowd is hollering, and Cosima is grinning at her, equal parts boldness and timidity. There's so much Delphine would like to say, but all she can muster is a simple, "Thank you," causing the brunette's grin to grow even broader.

Even with one final song to temper her emotions, to reign in her focus, Delphine can feel the weakness in her knees as they stand to leave. She remains at her kit, smiling distractedly and waving, allowing Felix and Cosima to soak up the applause. After a few long moments, Cosima waves a final time and begins to back away, Felix at her side. The blonde follows. The moment they're ensconced in the darkness of the wings, well out of sight of the still roaring audience, Delphine tugs Cosima behind by the back of her shirt.

"Hey, what's—" Before the brunette has time to question her, Delphine crashes their lips together, hands firmly cupping her cheeks.

Distantly, she can register Felix exasperatedly yelling at them—"Oh—for the love of god. Pants on until you've escaped the public eye, ladies!"—before huffing away to the green room.

After a few heated moments, Delphine breathlessly pulls away, watching Cosima's eyes flutter open. "Whoa," the brunette chuckles.

Delphine feels a giddy laugh bubbling within herself as she asks, "I thought you needed time to practice?"

"Well, I did," she tells her, eyes flickering over Delphine's face. "But I thought, uh—after this afternoon—you might need the pick-me-up more than I needed the practice." The blonde's smile softens. "I didn't mean to, like, leave you high and dry after… you know. I hope you didn't think that. But I didn't have a lot of time to practice, and I really wanted to get it right." Second-guessing herself suddenly, Cosima shakes her head. "I _should've_ checked on you first though—"

"Ma chérie. It's _fine._ I'm fine," she amends. "Well, I _was_ worried about you. Beth said you two ran into Mark, but she was being evasive. I wasn't sure what to think."

"Oh, he was just… it was nothing." Cosima's eyes dart away. Delphine kisses her softly once again, drawing her attention.

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, don't… don't worry. I mean—what did he say to you?" There's a fire in Cosima's eyes suddenly, a sort of scrappy protectiveness that warms Delphine to her toes.

"Exactly what you'd expect someone to say in this situation." The grainy photos of them from atop the van flash before her eyes, the 16,000 notes. She ignores the twisting in her stomach to press her forehead against Cosima's.

"And what did you say to him?" Cosima's voice is tentative, quieter. Delphine pulls back to look her in the eyes.

"That I was _sorry._ Because I do not love him, and there is nothing I can do to change that." Cosima nods, letting out a breath, but still doesn't quite meet her gaze. "Cosima, I _care_ about him. How could I not? But nothing more. He does not give me butterflies," she smiles, feeling the heat in her cheeks at this admission. "He does not touch my mind."

After a pause, Cosima tips her head back and kisses her deeply. When she pulls away, she trails her fingertips down Delphine's neck. "I'm sorry," she chuckles, "if I seem really insecure. Maybe I am. But I—I guess…"

"Hmm," Delphine encourages her, brushing their noses together.

"This is just… crazy," Cosima laughs. "I _don't_ want to fuck up."

"Is that what you're expecting? Because you're doing a pretty good job of just the opposite, Cosima. I mean—" Delphine laughs. "You just played a sappy love song for me in front of tens of thousands of people."

The brunette's eyes grow wide suddenly. "Oh, shit. Was that, like… super cheesy of me? God—it was, wasn't it?"

"It's exactly what every fourteen-year-old girl daydreams about," Delphine teases, squeezing her hips. Cosima groans, pushing out of the blonde's grasp with faux indignation. The impish smirk flirting at the edges of her mouth belies any offense she might feel. "Hey," Delphine laughs, catching up to her in a few easy strides as she exits the wings. "Don't be a brat," she says, voice lower than she'd intended, and pins Cosima against the corridor wall.

"I'm the brat?" The brunette shakes her head, continuing her pitiful charade. "Here I am, just spilling my guts out all over the stage, and you don't even have the heart to _humor_ me. Keep it up, and I might start to feel as I'm being taken advantage of…"

"Is that so?" Delphine raises a brow.

"Yeah, that _is_ so," she replies, petulantly crossing her arms over her chest. Still, Delphine can see the mirthful glimmer in her eyes.

Leaning forward, the blonde catches her by surprise, taking her earlobe between her teeth. She can feel the woman inhale as much as she can hear her. Grinning, she quietly husks, "You don't want me to take advantage of you anymore?"

"I, uh…" Delphine nips at her ear again, and she sighs. "No—I do. I _really_ do." Swallowing, she ducks her head and chuckles, _"Shit."_

"What?"

"I actually forgot you have to go back on stage again in less than an hour," she replies, burying her face in Delphine's neck. Despite this concern, she begins gently sucking on the blonde's pulse-point.

"Oh—you were ready to take me back to your van, weren't you?"

"Maybe…" Cosima kisses her neck more thoroughly, one hand working its way up the blonde's stomach. Her impending set suddenly feels so unimportant.

Sighing, she ducks down to capture the brunette's lips again, bruising them with her intensity. "We _don't_ have an hour," she reminds Cosima, breathing heavily through each kiss. Then, grabbing the guitarist by the hand and dragging her down the corridor, she decides, "but we have time."

Trailing behind her, Cosima's laughter echoes through the hall. "Well, then. You're the boss…"


	16. Sixteen

"What tuning are you in?" Art presses an ear to his acoustic, tinkering with the knobs on the headstock.

"Open G," Cosima tells him, picking mindlessly, gently at the strings of her borrowed instrument. Between the two of them, Paul and Art have enough guitars on this tour to fill her favorite little shop back in San Fran. She currently has three to her name.

"Yeah, that's what I thought," he mutters, concentrating on the strings. It's difficult to hear around the din in the green room, with both bands and a few choice roadies filling the space. Every couch and chair is occupied, with the overflow spread out on the carpet. Bottles already litter the tabletops, and the show is still six hours away.

_Madison Square Garden._ The name of the venue alone holds so much gravitas, weighting the atmosphere with tiny, electric currents. As a kid, Cosima's father had revered The Garden as if it were Eden itself. He'd seen The Rolling Stones play there as a teen, Neil Young as a college freshman, had taken her mother to see Tom Petty on their third date. Cosima had thought she'd never even get close to setting foot on the stage. Thrilled as she is to be wrong, she can hardly keep the tremors from her fingers, the sweat from pooling in her palms.

Sarah barks a laugh across the room, shoving Beth's shoulder. From the corner of her eye, Cosima can see a red-faced Cal sandwiched between them. Her thumb trips over the sloppy pattern she's been picking on Paul's Fender. She takes a breath, glancing to her right. Delphine is pressed warmly into her side, one arm thrown over the arm of the couch as she sips at her Cabernet. Her cheeks are rosy over the top of the glass, a coy smirk ghosting over the corners of her mouth. Cosima swallows. It's hard for her not to think of where that mouth has been in the past 24 hours.

"What are you playing," Paul calls from across the room, setting his beer on the coffee table next to Beth. Cosima blinks herself from her preoccupation, stuttering slightly.

"Just, uh… just picking," she says, licking her lips. She can see Delphine's smirk taking shape. The blonde sets her glass down and curls her other arm discreetly behind Cosima's neck, instantly finding a dread to twist between her fingers. Cosima smiles, shaking her head. "Here—I've got one for us. Easy to play along with."

Firming her grip on the neck of the guitar, she strums a G chord, followed by the famous opening riff. _One of Dad's favorite songs._ Idly, she wonders what sort of pride he feels, knowing her songs will be filling The Garden for the next two nights. She'd left him a voice message earlier in the morning, when they'd still been on the road. Too nervous even to hear how he might respond, she'd abandoned her phone in the car.

Delphine tugs on her dreads. "That's a good one," she chuckles. Cosima forgets about phone calls.

"Now we're talkin'!" Paul whoops, leaning against Beth's chair while he follows along.

" _I met a gin-soaked barroom queen in Memphis,"_ Cosima begins, voice inflected with her best Mick Jagger drawl. Delphine giggles again, leaning on her shoulder. She sings the next line in tandem with Cosima, directly into her ear, the others distantly joining.

" _She tried to take me upstairs for a ride…"_ Her voice is sweeter than the brunette's. Airier, yet somehow still throaty. The French lilt makes the tips of Cosima's fingers buzz, her stomach erupting with heat.

" _Jesus,"_ she mutters under her breath, stumbling into the next line as Paul, Art, Beth, and Sarah's voices take the lead. Delphine doesn't seem to want to give her a break. Her breath warms the shell of the brunette's ear, eliciting a shiver. Combined with the nervous energy she'd already been feeling, the sensation is overwhelming, dizzying.

Their hollers pick up in intensity as they reach the chorus, the entire room singing along. _"It's the honky-tonk women/Gimme, gimme, gimme the honky-tonk blues…"_

"That why you switched over to Europeans—right, Cos?" Beth smirks over her beer bottle, provoking more than a few sniggers.

Already flushed, Cosima's face grows hotter. "C'mon…"

"You can shut it," Delphine says, whipping a throw pillow across the room, missing her intended target by a wide enough margin to instead hit Paul square in the face.

"Hey!"

"Oops." Delphine stifles her giggles in Cosima's shoulder, as Beth erupts in whooping laughter.

"Anybody actually know the next verse," Art asks, repeating the opening riff again. They glance around, muttering nonsense and melodic _da-da-das_ before abandoning the verse for an immediate second chorus. The roadies are calling for a solo then, and Art and Cosima shrug into it, Paul keeping up the rhythm. There are claps and stomps through the room, egging them on.

"You can do better than that," Sarah shouts in Cosima's direction, taunting her plucky solo.

"Fine," Cosima tells her, rolling her eyes. She steals an empty beer bottle from the table and presses it to the neck of the guitar in a makeshift slide, careful of the pressure she's applying. It's not much of a substitute for the real thing, but in a pinch, it gets the job done.

Art and Cosima duel for a few moments, vying for the most impressive lick, before Paul joins in. The melody is lost, drowned amongst the guitar-ego and the hoots and hollers of their tourmates. All that remains is the steady _stomp-clap_ rhythm around the room. Bowing out, the three guitarists set aside their instruments, the room launching into a final chorus—a cappella.

They're startled from their excitement by two surprise spectators, applauding from the doorway.

"You sound good together," Leekie smiles, eyes scanning the room with that appraising manner of his. Rachel stands behind him, posture stiff, expression characteristically aloof.

"Aldous!" Paul, ever the forthcoming professional, leaps to his feet, thrusting a hand forward. "We didn't know you'd be joining us today."

"It's a big show," Leekie says, shaking Paul's hand. "And I just happened to be in the New York office—thought I'd stop by." He waves to the other band members. "It seems you're all doing well."

"Very well, yes," Delphine replies, removing her arm swiftly from behind Cosima's neck. There's a palpable shift in her demeanor—a straightening of her back, stiffening of her limbs. The brunette glances over at her, but Delphine's eyes are fixed on Leekie, an easy, yet somehow still unnatural smile plastered on her face. _Paul's not the only professional in the room,_ she has to remind herself.

"Good, good…" Cosima easily recalls what it was about Leekie's smile that seemed to unnerve her during their first few meetings. She feels just as much now as she did then that, when his eyes fall upon her, she is nothing more than a dollar sign—something to be acquired. Bought and sold. His gaze lingers upon her, upon the instrument in her hands, and something in her gut begins to coil. "It seems you've settled into tour life rather easily, Cosima."

She doesn't hesitate in answering. Even so, Delphine responds for her. "She really has—they all have." The blonde smiles at her, eyes warm, yet indistinctly so.

"Yeah, it's been…" She begins, watching Delphine, before turning back to Leekie, adopting a winning smile. "It's been a trip. Right?" She glances towards Sarah and Felix, who both smirk appreciatively – Sarah hanging over Cal, Felix sipping his whiskey.

"It's been an experience," Felix announces in a tone gracefully toeing the line between confidence and haughtiness. "I'm afraid to say though—the liquor was much better in Los Angeles."

Leekie raises his brows playfully, feigning shock. "I'm very sorry to hear that, Mr. Dawkins. Could I possibly make it up to you?"

"By all means," Felix drawls impishly, dramatically sweeping his hand out.

Leekie turns to address the entire room. "There are several hours left until show time. I'd love it if you'd all join me for lunch back at DYAD. I've called in one of my personal favorite restaurants for catering, and, as always, our liquor cabinet is stocked. Felix, you'll be happy to know I've a bottle of the Highland Park you enjoyed so much back in LA waiting."

"Ooh." Felix can hardly contain himself at the prospect. In fact, the entire room buzzes with the invitation. Cosima, on the other hand, thinks of the empty arena just down the corridor, the egg crate foam in the back of the van next to her portable turntable, the voice mail she'd abandoned in the center console. She feels reluctant, the thought of caviar or whatever-the-hell-rich-people-eat hollowing her already nervous stomach.

Delphine is beaming at her though. "Are you hungry?" Cosima's eyes dart from the blonde back to Leekie – who's staring about the room with easy satisfaction – very aware that lunches such as this probably aren't even optional.

* * *

" _Okay._ You've had enough." Cosima plucks the glass from Felix's hand as he's dropping in fresh ice cubes, fixing him with a stern expression in the process.

"I've had one," he protests, reaching for his snifter.

"Uh-uh." Cosima hops back, holding the glass to her chest. "One _here._ You had one back at the stadium, too."

The bassist rolls his eyes emphatically, placing hands on his hips. "I'm sure I have enough five-hundred-dollar-sushi in my stomach to soak it all up." After a stern pause, Cosima's hold on his glass unrelenting, Felix sighs, throwing his hands up in defeat. " _Fine._ Why aren't you mother-henning Sarah right now? She's just as bad as me, you know. Worse probably."

"Not today," Cosima tells him, leaning back against one of the floor-to-ceiling windows. It's a little disorienting, standing stories above the ground with little more than a pane of tinted glass between them. She feels as if she might fall through at any second. "Food poisoning has had her on her best behavior, actually. Blessing in disguise."

Felix smirks, crossing arms over his chest as he leans against the glass beside Cosima. "If you think a tummy ache is going to keep her from wreaking havoc, you've got another thing coming." Cosima snorts, and they lapse into comfortable silence.

DYAD's New York office is as ritzy as LA's. The brunette hadn't expected anything less, but she finds the show of opulence equally discomfiting. They'd admittedly been given star treatment since walking through the doors forty-five minutes earlier, but it has failed to impress or even calm Cosima. Every moment spent among the chatter has left her increasingly on edge, shifting from foot-to-foot as she picks sparsely at her lunch plate-the value of which likely exceeds her net worth.

It hasn't helped that Delphine has been busy schmoozing the entire time, chatting up Leekie and Rachel's colleagues. Her laughter sounds unrecognizable to Cosima from across the room—processed. She's passed the brunette a few warm glances, a wink or two while mingling; but they've done little to settle Cosima, who has quickly realized that whatever the two of them are in the privacy of a hotel or green room, over long phone calls used to pass late night drives—is not exactly what they are in the presence of industry executives.

"You know the really amazing thing about this place," Felix wryly asks, shaking her from her musing.

"Hmm?"

"Liquor in every cabinet. _Top shelf._ And they call this a business _..._ " He chuckles, tipping his head back. "It's like _Mad Men._ All I need now is some brawny, sharply-dressed man to boss me around, and I'll be in heaven."

Cosima snorts again. "You want for so little, Fee. I envy you."

"Well, not like I'd be here without you," he states matter-of-factly. "Which is, frankly, ironic. Considering you don't want to be here at all." Cosima can only shrug, a smirk teasing at the corners of her mouth. "I understand that—this—" He gestures across the room. "—fundamentally opposes your artistic idealism, or… whatever—"

"You make me sound so _pretentious_ ," Cosima interrupts, cringing.

"— _However_. Things could be worse."

"Why is that only vaguely comforting?"

"Because, dear," Felix shakes his head, placing a hand gently over the one clutching his pilfered glass, "you're sober." She glances down into the slowly melting ice, Felix squeezing her hand before retrieving a glass of brandy from the nearest table. "And I hate to break it to you," he says, pouring her a few fingers, "particularly in Sarah-speak, but..." Brow furrowed slightly, she glances up into his cheery face. With only a hint of friendly condescension, he cups her cheek, whispering, _"You need to chill the fuck out."_

And she probably does, she knows. Because in a few hours she'll be stepping on stage to perform what will be, undoubtedly, a tremendous career milestone in one of the most well-known venues in the country. And if she has any intention of _not_ majorly fucking it up, she'll need to uncoil some of the tension from her limbs.

Without pause, she takes a long sip from her glass, relishing the mild burn that follows. Felix affectionately pinches her cheeks, stealing the snifter from her hand in the same motion.

"Gay wisdom tax," he grins, taking a sip before placing the glass back in her hand. "Now, finish that."

"Fine," she mutters, swirling the brandy with a sigh. "Thanks for the kick in the ass."

Felix shrugs proudly. "I can't have you being so uptight. You'll make me look bad."

"Like a real square, huh," she teases.

"I'm not kidding. I have a reputation to maintain, and—oh," he quiets suddenly, a curious smirk on his face as he glances over her shoulder. "Speaking of…"

"Cosima. Felix." Cosima stiffens again, adopting a bright smile before turning around to greet Leekie. "I hope I'm not interrupting." He smiles warmly at both of them, though his interest seems to be fixed mainly on the guitarist.

"Hardly!" Cosima glances sidelong at Felix, feeling somewhat betrayed by his openness, his total affability.

Clearing her throat, she feels obligated to join him. "Trust me, I rarely get to spend more than a few hours a day _without_ talking to him—there is no interrupting." She smiles, closed-mouthed, as Aldous chuckles.

"Well, then," he lays a hand on Cosima's shoulder, "I don't suppose I should feel guilty asking you to take a little walk with me then?"

"A walk?" Out of the corner of her eye, she can see Felix's brows raise slightly, his curiosity piqued. "You're not about to give us the boot, are you," she jokes.

Leekie laughs. "A little late for that, isn't it?"

"This is the music business. It's never too late for failure." He quirks an eyebrow, smile turning sly as he looks her over. In spite of her humor, the nerves tighten her gut.

"Ms. Niehaus… we have a lot to talk about. Please—follow me." Nodding to Felix, he says, "I won't keep her for long—promise," before steering her towards the door. On her way out, she catches Delphine's eye. The blonde smiles reassuringly, nodding—a sort of countenance that is meant to say, _"It's fine. Don't worry."_ Nevertheless, down the hall, in the elevator ride up to the sixth floor, Cosima does nothing but.

The small talk focuses on the tour thus far, the band's accommodations, their enjoyment. "It's far more travelling than we've done before," Cosima admits. "I mean, we've played all over the country, but typically we stick to one coast at a time."

"Do you find it exhausting?"

"Well…" Cosima chooses her words carefully. Uncomfortable as she may be, she doesn't want to seem ungrateful. Ultimately, this tour is still the greatest opportunity she has yet been afforded in her career. Leekie is the one who gave it to her. "The driving is the worst part. Kills my back. But I don't get tired of the performing."

Leekie stops before an ornate door, his name written on the placard adorning it. "Do you suppose you ever would?" Cosima steps inside as he holds the door open for her, her gaze discreetly scanning the office. It's a bit warmer than the conference room they'd had lunch in, though the architecture is similar, furnished with fine woods, plush carpeting, exotic knick-knacks. In addition to the abstract works of art embellishing the walls, several gold and platinum albums hang beside them, gleaming brightly in the light streaming through the windows.

Leekie strides past her, wearing a coy grin. He picks up a decanter from the table beside his desk, pouring himself a glass. "Need a refill?" He points to the snifter she'd dumbly carried with her from the conference room, still filled with half a finger of brandy. Blushing, she quickly downs the rest of it and nods.

"Please." He fills her glass for her, leaving her to stand dead center in the room as he returns the decanter to the table.

After taking a small sip, clearly savoring the liquor upon his tongue, he asks, "Would you?"

She peels her eyes from the records, having spotted In Vitro's platinum on the wall. "I—sorry. Would I what?"

"Tire of the performing."

"Oh!" She shakes her head. "I don't—well, I really doubt it." He pads across the floor to stand beside her, one hand tucked casually into his pocket while he swirls his drink.

"Why is that, exactly?"

She shrugs, taking a sip of her own whiskey. "It's all I've ever done, really. Since I was a kid. Even when it was just me, in my basement, singing to a coat rack. I was performing." She takes another sip, nervously, feeling as if she shouldn't be so candid, but daring to do so anyway. "At some point, it stops being a job, or even a hobby. It's just something you do to… get on." Shrugging, she rotates the glass in her hand and concludes, "I don't know."

Leekie says nothing, merely nods, grunting thoughtfully in acknowledgement. After a moment of prolonged silence he walks over to the row of records hanging on the wall, pointing to the exact platinum Cosima had been eyeing earlier. Waving her over, he says, "You should see this up close."

She swallows and stands beside him, eye-to-eye with the press shot of In Vitro matted into the record frame. In this photo, Delphine stands at the back of the group, distanced from her bandmates, wearing an expression serious enough to make Cosima want to laugh. She can't, however. It looks like the blonde is staring at her.

"What do you think of this?"

"It's impressive," Cosima answers, her tone certain, though her thoughts are tentative.

"In a word—sure." He pauses, taking a sip. The ice clinks in his glass. "A couple years ago, I met a friend—a colleague—for lunch at a bistro downtown. He was telling me about his daughter—she was attending college in Portland at the time. Now, the truth is, Cosima, though he was a friend of mine, and a good one at that, I couldn't have cared less about his daughter. But, you know parents—they get so proud sometimes, they can't help themselves. He was smart enough to sense my boredom, and, as a means of appealing to my interests, he mentioned that the last time he and his daughter had spoken, she'd raved about some band that she'd seen recently."

Smiling wistfully, he glances down at Cosima. " _'They're from LA,'_ he said. _'And the kids love them. Maybe you should check them out.'_ I told him, _'Okay. Why don't you write down their name?'_ So he does—writes them down on a cocktail napkin, slides it across the table. I tuck it into my pocket without any intention of ever looking them up. And, really, I wasn't going to. But, coincidentally, over the next few weeks, I'd see their concert flyers hanging up in coffee shops, stapled to telephone poles, and—I'm not the kind of man who searches for signs, but seeing their name over and over, I just thought, _What the hell?_ " He pauses, taking a sip of his drink.

"In Vitro. I saw them for the first in some dive downtown. Terrible show—technical problems, a sour crowd. But they were just… they had personality. They were attractive. Their songs were catchy. I _liked_ them." He laughs to himself. "Did I think they'd be _big_? Platinum-record-big?" He glances at Cosima again, pausing for effect. "No. I didn't." After a long moment, simply watching the brunette, measuring her, he strolls over to his desk, taking a seat behind it. Smiling gently, he gestures to the seat across from him. Cosima complies, heart racing.

"Truth is, they likely wouldn't be producing platinum records if they weren't producing them with _us._ Marketing—plays a bigger part than you could possibly imagine." Rethinking this statement, he tilts his head to the side. "Then again, you strike me as being very… clever."

Cosima laughs abruptly, attempting to smother her nerves. "I was clever when I was, like, six."

"Of course." He smirks again, eyes glinting. "You can probably guess what I'm about to offer you then." Cosima's mouth goes dry suddenly, and she was has a difficult time swallowing the whiskey she forces into her mouth.

"I probably can," she tells him.

"Cosima… when I look at you, I don't exactly see a sold out Madison Square Garden—simply the truth. But that was simply the truth with In Vitro, as well. What I _do,_ see, however, is a cunning, naturally talented artist with an ability to command a crowd. I wouldn't have to stretch my imagination very far to envision—" He nods towards the platinum record. "—your record hanging on my wall."

Cosima is clutching her glass so hard between her damp palms that she can imagine it splintering. Licking her lips, she says, without any sense of pretense, "So, you're offering me a record deal."

Smiling, Leekie opens up the top drawer of his desk, pulls out a manila envelope, and offers it to her. She tries to keep her hand steady when she takes it. "You don't have to read that here," he tells her, though she hasn't begun to open it. "It's a very big decision. I understand that. And the logistics can be rather involved in a deal such as this." Offering a distasteful expression, he waves the notion off, before resettling. Leaning forward, he assures her, "Brass tacks—you'd have access to the finest equipment and producers in the industry, extensive touring, thorough publicity. And, financially… you'd be well-taken care of, whether your first record is a hit or not." Pausing, with a hint of smugness, he asks, "Would that be something of interest to you?"

Cosima surprises herself by mustering the words to answer. "I—I definitely find it _interesting._ " Her heart pounds in her chest. She feels suddenly nauseated.

"I thought so," Leekie laughs. After a moment, he downs the last of his whiskey, and stands, grinning widely. "Now is _not_ the time for logistics though. Like I said, this is a big decision. I want you to think on it, Cosima—really. Read through the contract, speak it over with your friends, a lawyer." He rounds the desk, stopping beside her chair. She feels overwhelmed by the way he towers over her. "I'll be hoping for an answer by the end of this week—by the end of the tour. Does that seem fair?"

Cosima stares up into his eyes, then past him. She sees Delphine's face staring back at her from the record frame. _Does that seem fair?_

It really doesn't.

* * *

Nothing seems more arbitrary than memory. Particularly when there are so many important moments – parting words, pieces of advice, smells and sights that once set Cosima's mind aflame – that flicker and fade like the picture on an antique television. Yet, somehow, the minutiae leaps to her consciousness with such painstaking clarity.

_She's six-years-old, sitting in the back of her parents' maroon Honda. Mom and Dad are carrying on a conversation about one of Mom's students – a bright 19-year-old with an affinity for Chekhov's early work – while Cosima sits strapped into her booster seat, watching the raindrops race down the window's glass (the one on the left wins, but it's a photo-finish). The radio is playing, cutting in and out of static, so Dad turns the dial, scanning stations. Car commercials—Beethoven's 5_ _th_ _—"Kiss from a Rose"—_

" _Cosima!" She startles, looking up with wide eyes to see Dad staring at her with an excited expression, his hand frozen on the radio dial. "Listen," he exclaims. His turns the dial sharply to the right, the car speakers peaking suddenly. Cosima scrunches her nose in confusion, inundated by the abrupt rise in volume._

" _Hon," Mom begins, her tone full of reproach, "turn it down."_

" _No, no—" His voice seems to vibrate, full of urgency. Cosima can see him watching her intently in the rearview mirror. "Kiddo, this—one of the greatest songs ever written! One of_ my _favorite songs."_

" _Okay," she tentatively replies. Is this a test? Will she be in trouble if she fails? She doesn't know._

" _Just listen, listen…" They're stopped at a red light and Dad is singing in his terrible falsetto, whistling through his teeth in place of every lyric he can't remember._

"Baby, I can't stay/you got to roll me/and call me the tumblin' dice."

" _Your daughter thinks you're a lunatic right now,"_ _Mom mumbles, before shaking her head affectionately, turning back to face Cosima with a sly smile. "Humor Daddy, will you," she says, and winks._

_She's 14-years-old then, and she's got the amplifier she's saved up for an entire year to buy set up in the living room, department store electric buzzing in her hands. She takes a deep breath, looks at the grandfather clock in the living room. Her parents won't be home for another hour, and she's_ glad _, because if they were here, they'd tell her to plug in her headphones, to pick up her acoustic instead._

_She plugs the cord into the jack, adjusts her guitar strap. She turns the dial sharply to the right._

_The room seems to shake when she strikes the first chord—her skeleton quaking, sighing in relief. Eyes close._

"Sell the kids for food/weather changes moods," _she sings, voice droning with that sleepy, grunge affectation, and slides easily through the progression._

_When she opens her eyes, Dad is standing in the doorway, dropping his work bag to the floor. He gazes at her, eyes wide and curious._

_Feeling embarrassed, caught, she quickly reaches down, ready to turn the dial back. Dad steps forward, throwing up a hand._

_Shaking his head, he smiles and says, "Just keep playing."_

_Finally, she's 20-years-old. A little drunk and a little stoned, sitting on a motel bed in Washington with her cell phone hot against her ear. It's late September, a month past the date she would have returned to school, if she hadn't dropped out. A day ago the university sent letters of resignation to her home address. Had they not, Mom and Dad probably still wouldn't know._

_The blinds are drawn to keep out the afternoon sun. She's just driven fourteen hours and should be sleeping, like Felix and Sarah. When she answers the question Dad's just repeated for the third time, her voice is low, so as not to wake them._

" _I don't know how you can even be surprised by this. Like, how did you not see this coming?"_

" _Don't give me that shit, Cosima—"_

" _I'm not being smart. I seriously can't believe it. I mean—how could you have lived with me for the last—what?—thirteen years?—and just… totally did not see this coming?"_

_Dad pauses for a long moment. He thought she_ knew _better. He thought she'd be more practical, that she'd find a real job, put her intelligence to good use. Heat pricks the backs of her eyes._

" _You're just… you're just throwing your youth away, Cosima. And for what?" She hits the end call button before allowing another pause._

_It's all circular. She's six-years-old again. Dad's hand is on the radio dial. It's turning sharply to the left._

It's been five years, and she still doesn't talk to them as often as she ought to. That's her fault, she thinks, because even though they've long since accepted her choices, she feels resentful that they ever felt they had the begrudging need to in the first place. More than that, she feels a sense of betrayal, particularly for the father who had sung falsetto Stones tunes to her on a Sunday drive, blowing out speakers in the name of imparting wisdom, but had turned his nose up at her own musical pursuits.

His excitement is what always got her. He'd doled it out so readily in her childhood, singing the praises of other musicians; but when, as an adult, she'd made the decision to follow in their footsteps, he'd had nothing to show but disappointment.

Cosima turns the dial on her old iPod—sharply to the right. What would he say, if he knew about the manila envelope she'd hidden inside of her backpack? Aldous Leekie had thought her extremely deserving. Would he feel the same? Would it have any bearing whatsoever on her decision?

_No,_ she tells herself. _Not anymore._

Cosima startles, eyes bolting open when one of the buds is pulled from her ear. "Hey," she squeaks, sitting up quickly enough to dizzy herself.

Delphine crouches beside her, smirking. "I'm sorry to startle you," she chuckles.

"No, you're not." Cosima shakes her head, petulantly stealing back her headphone. She turns off her iPod, setting it on the stage beside her.

"What are you doing out here?"

The brunette stares out at the empty arena, gaze climbing into the nosebleeds. "Just… meditating. I guess."

" _Meditating._ " Delphine takes a seat, bumping her shoulder. "You disappeared after we returned from lunch." Cosima doesn't reply—doesn't feel a need to. "Are you all right?"

Not particularly ready to answer, she smiles and asks, "How do I look?" Delphine examines her closely, gaze intense. She swallows through the tightness in her throat.

"Like you've been thinking very hard." Cosima raises her brows, turning back out to face the empty stadium. "Hey, I—" The blonde's voice softens, and she shifts a little closer. "Did I seem weird earlier? I'm sorry if I seemed weird."

"You kind of did, to be honest."

Delphine frowns, shaking her head. "I don't mean to—I just go into this sort of… professional mode. We owe a lot to those people."

"I can understand that." And she can—to an extent—though it doesn't mean she finds that level of pretense to be any less exhausting.

"But—" Doubting her own words perhaps, the blonde sighs. "You were uncomfortable."

There's barely a hint of sarcasm in Cosima's laugh. "That obvious, huh?"

"They're not exactly your sort of people, Cosima."

She shrugs, thinking maybe she ought to feel offended; however, she knows it's the truth. "No. They're not."

"It probably would've helped if I had stuck by you—"

"I don't need you to hold my hand." She's surprised by the suddenness with which her defense rears. The surprise shows on Delphine's face, too. "Whoa." She laughs at herself nervously, rubbing her temple. "Sorry. I'm, like… a little on edge."

The blonde threads their fingers together. "Why?" Before Cosima can offer her an excuse, she asks, "Was it your little… talk with Aldous?" Her eyes narrow slightly, and she turns to face Delphine, wondering how much she knows. She hadn't allowed anyone to see her with the contract. "What did he want, anyway?" The question is sincere enough that she feels some relief.

"Nothing interesting." She lies too easily, feeling a pang of shame in her gut. "Wanted to make sure we're saving all of our receipts, keeping track of expenses. At the very least, DYAD wants us taken care of."

"They take care of their clients."

"Clearly." Cosima pauses. Half of her wants to tell Delphine about the offer. The other half feels it necessary to wait. Diplomatically, she decides on, "I think he's trying to warm me to the major label or something." She laughs, smothering her nerves. "It's not like I see them as the _enemy_ —nothing that dramatic. But I'm just…"

"Independent," Delphine asks, a hint of sarcasm and something else, something mildly tired in her voice. Cosima bites the inside of her cheek. "I think he likes you, Cosima. Really." The blonde plays with her fingers, eyes on the stage floor.

"He must. He's paying for me," she jokes.

Delphine rolls her eyes. "It's not just that though. When it comes to this business, he's more… old fashioned. Self-made artists, digital artists—I think he considers them a threat." Cosima straightens. "I think he might consider _you_ a bit of a threat."

She snorts, offering Delphine a genuinely cheeky grin. "You think I'm intimidating?"

The blonde takes an emphatically deep breath before replying. "The _most_ intimidating." Cosima bares her canines, heart thumping when she tackles Delphine suddenly to the stage, eliciting a yelp. Forcing the negative thoughts from her mind, she pins the woman's hands swiftly above her head. "What are you doing?"

Cosima leans in close, smirking. "Maybe he _should_ feel threatened."

Delphine's breathing quickens. "Should he?"

"Yeah." Cosima nips at her bottom lip. "I'm like… the Kublai Khan of the record business. You just watch—" She kisses her briefly, slowly, before pulling back and whispering, "a few years from now, DYAD will be mine. And in the spirit of _independence_ …" She licks her own lips, staring intently at Delphine's mouth. Her eyes dilate under the shadow of Cosima's body. "I'm gonna run that place straight into the ground."

She doesn't get the chance to laugh at herself before Delphine pulls her flush against her, hungrily swallowing her fears.


	17. Seventeen

By noon Sunday, the sun is high, and the Delaware River shimmers like a diamond beneath it. Cosima, Felix, and Sarah amble around Penn's Landing, trading a bag of gummy bears back and forth while they wait for the guitarist's cousin to arrive.

It hadn't escaped either of her bandmates that Cosima had been especially quiet during the drive to Philadelphia; however, they'd merely written it off as some adolescent-inspired melancholy at being separated from Delphine for half the day.

In truth, Cosima had felt some relief when Delphine had told her that In Vitro would be spending the morning in New York for a private breakfast with the DYAD team. She had yet to tell the blonde about the deal Aldous had offered her, and was starting to think she'd prefer he deliver the news himself. If Delphine would be angry with her for keeping the secret, then so be it—she deserved it. The anger would cause her less guilt than the quiet concern she'd been receiving for her evasiveness over the past day.

She's not sure yet how she ought to feel. Thinking about her meeting with Leekie-seeing Delphine's face on his wall, the stack of papers still hidden in her backpack-makes her stomach twist with nausea.

"Oi, Amadeus." Sarah bumps her shoulder, rousing her from her thoughts.

"Huh?"

The drummer holds up the bag of candy, now half diminished. "Want any more?"

Her stomach twists again, rebelling against the thought of sugar in its weakened state, while her traitorous mouth salivates. "Gimme," she says grumpily, holding out her hand.

" _Tsk tsk._ " Felix shakes his head in mock disapproval, arms crossed.

"That how you ask?" Sarah raises the bag high over her head.

"Seriously?" Cosima rolls her eyes, sighing dramatically.

"Look—you miss your bloody girlfriend. I get it. That doesn't mean you get to act like a brat all day."

" _For crying out loud_ —" She takes a deep breath, glancing first at Felix for support, but receiving only a shrug; and then to Sarah. "Will you just give me the damn gummy bears?" Begrudgingly, the drummer hands over the bag with a raised brow. When Cosima takes it, she turns to watch the river gently coursing, throwing off glittering reflections that make painful spots behind her eyes.

"Shit, you're in a _mood_ today. Do you really miss Delphine that bad?"

Cosima narrows her eyes, handful of gummies suspended halfway to her mouth. " _You_ really think I'm that pathetic, huh?"

" _Pathetic_ is a little harsh," Felix replies.

"Maybe just… _hung up,_ " Sarah supplies, clapping her on the back.

"I do have _some_ dignity, you know." In spite of this, she answers through a mouth full of candy, unconcerned for propriety. "Even when it comes to, like… obscenely attractive women."

"Whom you have an unprecedented emotional connection to," Felix adds teasingly, hand over his heart.

Cosima glances at him sidelong, gaze venomous. "You know what I think the real problem is?"

"What," Sarah and Felix both ask in tandem. In this moment, Cosima can see genuine concern in both of their expressions, though it is heavily masked by their sarcasm. With another pang of guilt, she considers telling them, right there, about the deal. However, just as quickly as the impulse seizes her, she's gripped by an overwhelming sense of exhaustion at actually _having_ the conversation.

Instead, she feigns impishness, grinning toothily as she tells them, "I think I just haven't been getting much sleep lately."

"C'mon." Sarah grouses, Felix chuckling behind her. "I don't wanna hear about that shite."

Cosima shrugs. "Don't get me wrong—I'm not complaining."

"Whatever…" As Felix's chuckles die out, Cosima's nerves ebbing slowly, silence settles between them.

Staring out at the water, the bassist comments, "I was actually wondering if you might be getting homesick."

"What?" Cosima raises her eyebrows in surprise. Should she be homesick, she wonders? In all honesty, she hasn't thought of home in days—hasn't thought of Felix's couch, her cheap storage unit, her pot dealer. The longer she's away, the less those things even feel like home.

"You get contemplative around water. I assume it reminds you of the bay."

"Are you teasing me again?"

"No," Felix tells hers, and she can see he's being honest.

"He's got a point," Sarah says.

"Huh." She considers this for a moment, stealing another handful of gummies. "I don't know about that. Maybe once, but… there's not a lot waiting for me back there. I mean—my whole life is in the van right now, just about. The instruments, the equipment, all of my clothes and electronics… shit—even you guys."

Beside her, she can see Sarah shifting, always uncomfortable with sentiment. "I feel like you're about to say something sappy."

Cosima laughs, patting Sarah's back. "I'll spare you." She pauses. "All I'm saying is… I don't have a lot to my name right now. San Francisco may be where I've spent most of my life, but I'm not sure that it's home anymore."

"That's oddly sweet," Felix says, after a moment. "But if you try to tell me that godforsaken shit-box-on-wheels is starting to feel like home, I will have you committed." Cosima laughs again, and it's the first time in hours that she feels her burden lifting, if only slightly.

The moment is broken by the wolf-whistle that sounds suddenly behind them, followed immediately by an obnoxious, and very familiar, " _Hello_ , gorgeous!"—a greeting that elicits an involuntary squeal from Cosima.

"Tony!" Spinning quickly on her heels, she charges toward the young man with the full intention of knocking him off his feet. As usual, however, he catches her in a suffocating bear hug, mischievous grin still fixed in place, and sweeps her off her feet.

"How presumptuous of you, Cos. That greeting could very well have been meant for me," Felix calls from behind her. Grinning, she pulls back from the embrace, Tony setting her carefully back on the ground, and raises an eyebrow in her cousin's direction. He can only shrug in response, winking playfully.

Slinging an arm around Cosima's shoulder, Tony strolls forward, beckoning Felix and Sarah into his arms. He lingers slightly with the other man, whispering something into his ear that neither woman can make out; something that causes Felix to shove him back with a bellowing laugh and an uncharacteristic blush.

"Don't start that shite already!"

"What?" Tony passes a glance to both Sarah and Cosima, eyebrows raised innocently. "Since when have I _ever_ been a shit-starter?"

"Be nice to Felix," the guitarist commands, poking him in the ribs.

"Hey—" He pouts, tugging on one of her dreads. "Back me up, Cuz."

"Oi—" Sarah throws her hands up, eyes darting between Felix and Tony. "I'm tellin' you right now—I catch the two of in another _compromising situation_ tonight, and you're both getting your asses beat."

"Now, that seems a little hypocritical, Ms. Manning—" Sarah interjects with a swift cuff on his arm. "Hey! I'm a sensitive boy, remember? Bruise like a peach…"

"Well, _parts_ of you, at least—" Felix begins, only to be cut off by a shove from his sister.

Sarah points a finger sternly in Tony's direction then. "You're footing my tab today, Sawicki."

"I doubt he could afford that," Cosima chuckles. "Where are you taking us, Tone?"

"I thought we'd head to Fishtown."

Cosima groans. "We are _not_ going to the casino again. That was a disaster last time." She glances pointedly at Sarah, who can only smirk in return.

"I learned my lesson. Thought we'd go to Barcade this time—get a little buzzed before the show. Play some _Golden Axe_."

"You do realize the superstars will be joining us later, don't you," Felix asks, following Tony as he leads them towards the street, arm linked with Cosima's.

"Consider it a test," he says, glancing down at his cousin. "They can't hold their own on the machines, we kick 'em to the curb. Right?"

Cosima holds his gaze with a smile, feeling as if he knows more than he possibly could. "Yeah," she tells him, feeling equal parts defiant and excited.

* * *

"Start mashing buttons—c'mon!"

"Dude… I have a little more tact—" Cosima hunches over the machine, tongue poking out between her teeth in concentration. "—than _that._ "

"I'm getting swarmed," Tony laughs, eyes lighting despite the furrow in his brow.

"Just hold on—ten seconds." Fingers darting over the buttons and joystick with unsurprising agility, she cuts her way through her own swarm of enemies, directing her focus to the horde of skeletons currently battering Tony's Ax Battler.

"Jesus," he exhales dramatically, health bar blinking red as they crush the final adversary. "You really took your damn time there. I was one hit away from losing a life."

Smirking, Cosima takes a sip from the lukewarm bottle of beer sitting beside the machine. "Best to go slow, Tone. Makes your victory all the more satisfying."

"Oh, you don't have to tell me, Cuz." He holds his own bottle of beer up to Cosima's for a clink, taking a long pull immediately after. With a wink he tells her, "I'm no stranger to satisfaction."

"Must run in the family," Beth calls sarcastically behind them, shoving Cosima's shoulder as she walks past. Trailing behind her, buzzed from a combination of expensive breakfast mimosas and beer, Delphine giggles sweetly, sending a chill down the guitarist's spine. She can't help the blush that creeps up her neck, the tingling in her limbs. It's involuntary, almost aggravating.

Cosima failed to mention to Tony that she and Delphine had been sleeping together. To tell him they were in a relationship seemed disingenuous—they'd yet to define what they'd gotten themselves into. With the added stress of Leekie's deal, doing so almost seems superfluous, nerve-wracking. Pretending is more fun. More comfortable.

With the exception of her bandmates, Tony knows Cosima better than anyone, though. She wouldn't have to be obvious in her attraction, in their flirtations for him to cotton on. She's tried to maintain distance with Delphine since In Vitro met them at the bar an hour earlier for this very reason. Half-drunk, the blonde has been surprisingly needy.

Delphine leans back against the machine next to theirs, wearing an amused, almost haughty smile. Cosima attempts to focus on the game as she and Tony scroll through into the next level, enemies already flooding from the right side of the screen; however, the blonde doesn't seem content to allow anything but _her_ to capture Cosima's attention so fully.

Brushing her foot along the brunette's ankle, she says, "This game doesn't make very much sense to me."

Tony laughs, glancing at her sweetly out of the corner of his eye. "Trust me, Blondie. There's not a lot to get." His voice is characteristically saccharine, forever stricken with a flirtatious edge. While Cosima always finds it very amusing when directed towards Felix or Sarah, it makes her feel oddly _possessive_ when Delphine is on the receiving end _._

"Please elaborate," Cosima says, shaking off the feeling with a smile. She nudges Delphine back.

"Well, it seems very illogical that these warriors would be battling in the nude."

Cosima barks a laugh. "They're not nude!"

"They might as well be. Look at that man—" She points at Tony's character, leaning close over Cosima's shoulder. "He's waving around a giant sword in nothing but a speedo and boots. It's very…"

"Gay," Tony asks her, grinning.

" _Hella_ gay," Cosima affirms with a nod.

The blonde smiles coyly. "Well, I was going to say dangerous."

" _Golden Axe's_ charm is about ninety percent homoeroticism," Tony estimates.

"Ten percent giant swords."

"Yeah, that still falls under the homoeroticism umbrella."

"Fair enough," Cosima nods, holding out her hand, palm up, for Tony to slap her a quick five. Their eyes never leave the screen. Delphine smiles impishly, amused and equally warmed by the easy repartee between the cousins.

"I should probably assume, then, that this was your favorite game growing up. Shouldn't I?"

Tony's eyes widen slightly before narrowing in mock offense. "And _what_ exactly are you implying, Ms. Cormier?" Delphine chuckles, glancing at Cosima. She shrugs. "Ah, I see how it is. She wants to play coy. Don't think I'll let you get away that shit just because you're gorgeous." He smiles his shit-eating grin, and Cosima naturally drifts a bit closer to Delphine's side. Tony's gaze darts rapidly between the blonde and his cousin then, corners of his mouth noticeably twitching, and winks at her.

It's that little wink, that subtle shifting of eyes that makes her wary. Compounded with the way Delphine edges blatantly closer—pinching her side, dragging nails lightly up her bicep—her earlier anxieties protest. Tony has figured them out, more than likely, and while it doesn't surprise Cosima, it doesn't leave her feeling comfortable either. She can only take a few minutes of this teasing before her focus slips, her game character falling victim to a horde of ghouls.

"Your game's weak, Cos. Uncharacteristically so." Tony's eyes fall to where Delphine's hand currently rests above her hip. Oblivious, the blonde carries on a discussion with Art at the next machine. Tony smiles around the mouth of his beer as he tips it back, taking the last swig. "C'mon, Cuz. Let's order another round."

"I haven't finished mine—" She begins distractedly, though before she can finish, Tony plucks up her bottle as well, downing nearly half of it in one pull.

"I have. C'mon." He throws his arm around her shoulder again, steering her towards the bar. "Be back in a few minutes, Blondie," he winks, pacifying a suddenly bereft Delphine. Tony stops to whisper in Felix's ear as they pass by, requesting a few moments of privacy. Nodding dutifully in response, the bassist pats Cosima comfortingly on the ass as she shuffles past.

Well away from the others, Tony sits down at the bar, the guitarist taking a seat beside him. He orders them another round, quiet until their beers are set in front of them. Once in his hand, he holds his bottle up for another silent toast with Cosima.

"I'm surprised you didn't tell me," he says, not bothering to feign any hurt as he sets his beer back on the bar. "I mean—I know we don't talk _every_ day. Not like we used to. But _that_..." his gaze flicks in Delphine's direction, "That's some real news."

"Yeah?" She smiles weakly, feeling a little ashamed. She and Tony don't text or call every day. Sometimes not even every week; but it's still unusual for them not to know everything major going on in each other's lives. Sometimes, this might mean a month of radio silence followed by a five-hour phone call in the dead of night. Neither of them has ever minded. "Because she's, like, a _rockstar_ ," Cosima asks, her tone somewhat caustic.

"Well, she is, yeah. She's also a major babe. And… damn, dude. That accent is like…"

"Don't get any ideas, Tone."

"Fuckin' charmer, you are. I _commend_ you." He takes another sip, gaze finally meeting Cosima's. She's surprised not to find the usual mischief present. Instead, there's genuine happiness and confusion. "That's not why I'm surprised though."

"No?"

He pauses, head tilting. "There's been something off about you today, you know? You seemed nervous—still do. I chalked it up to tour anxiety, at first. Then this chick walks in." He laughs, smoothing back his long, wavy hair. "I think you were holding your breath up until that moment, man. And you've been acting all stiff, trying to pretend like there's nothing going on. But you melted."

After a moment, he continues. "So… okay. I take back what I said before. I'm _not_ surprised you didn't tell me. Because I know you've got no problem running your mouth about someone when it's just a casual thing. But when it's actually serious, you button up like you're on trial or something." He chuckles again, nudging Cosima's shoulder. His voice drops to a whisper. "What the hell you all jittery for? That girl _digs_ you. Rockstar or no, she's too damn _smitten_ to hide it."

Cosima takes a sip of her beer, attempting to quell the fist that seems to have clenched around her guts. She hadn't wanted to have this conversation today. She hadn't wanted to have it this week, or even this month, really.

Before she has a chance to explain herself, Tony is shaking his head again, saying, "That's probably how this shit ended up on the internet so fast."

Cosima's head whips around, eyes wide. The background noise fades. "Tony… what exactly do you mean?"

"I mean, after it started blowing up on tumblr—" He stops, his own eyes going wide. "Shit. You _know_ , right?" When she doesn't answer, he stares ahead at the rows of liquor lining the walls, mirroring her dumbstruck reaction. " _Shit."_ Quickly, he recovers, placing a hand on Cosima's forearm. "You heard about the article, right?"

_Article,_ she screams in her head. "Tony, I didn't know about _tumblr._ What the hell is going on?"

Sensing her urgency, he grabs her hand and begins dragging her towards the door. "Now we really need privacy. Look," he begins once they're standing outside, the midafternoon sun bright. "You just calm down first, because it's not that big of a fucking deal—"

"Then why are you using your _don't-jump_ tone with me?"

"I'm not—" He takes a deep breath, grabbing her shoulders. "I'm sorry. Really—it's fine. But you should know about this shit." He pulls his phone from his back pocket and begins scrolling, eyes on the screen as he rushes through an explanation. "Last week, there were a few photos on tumblr. Some fan took them after a show. They were pretty blurry, but it _looked_ like you and Delphine, okay? And that's what they were telling everybody. So, then, some trashy gossip mag gets ahold of them, and _they_ start stirring the pot—" He hands his phone to Cosima, grainy photos emblazoned on the screen beneath the bolded headline— _In Vitro's Delphine Cormier Spotted Getting Cozy With Indie Darling Cosima Niehaus._

"Oh my god, Tone. Why didn't you tell me," she asks, throwing her hands in the air and nearly losing his phone in the process.

"Cos," he grabs her wrist, easing the phone from her hand, "I was sure you knew. And I didn't want to add to the stress. Like, I wasn't going to say something unless you brought it up to me—"

"Oh my god."

"Calm down, dude." He lowers his voice, taking a breath. "Look… I hate to have to tell you, but that's not even the worst of it." She looks at him questioningly, eyes bulging. He sighs, opening another tab on his phone. "The photos, the article-it's all pretty vague, you know? Just rumors and shit. But then…" He grimaces slightly, afraid to reveal the next piece of information.

"Just tell me, Tone."

"Well, Delphine's—I guess—her ex?" Cosima's stomach drops. "Some magazine called _him_ , and he was like… all broken up. Totally confirmed the whole thing. Talked about how you guys had this affair—"

" _Affair_?" He shakes his head, handing her the phone. It's all right there—an inside scoop from Delphine's devastated longtime boyfriend— _nice-guy_ photographer, Mark Rollins—plying for sympathy while painting Delphine as an insensitive adulteress, Cosima the careless homewrecker.

"And, like, _I_ know you, Cos. And I know not to believe everything I read on the internet—"

"This is bullshit," she says quietly, almost too disgusted to read, but unable to stop, nevertheless. He crosses his arms over his chest, kicking the toe of his scuffed up combat boot into the sidewalk. "She never cheated," she tells him firmly, speaking through the sudden tightness of her throat. "We were respectful—both of us! And I know the guy is hurt, but how could he—" Feeling nauseated, she thrusts the phone back into Tony's hand. "No, this is insane, man. They can't just print lies like that!"

"Cos," he begins, watching her pace. "They're still rumors. Just because her ex testified to it—"

"You think subjectivity makes a difference? What the _fuck_ , dude. This is like… what? A scandal?"

"It's… I don't know. Taylor Swift has scandals, you know? Justin Bieber. You're just…"

"The no-name tramp who banged her way into the limelight?" The silence hangs between them for a moment, the vehemence of her own words weighing heavily. After several moments, she quietly says, "It's not fair."

Unsure of what else to do, Tony envelops her in a calming hug. "It's okay— _really_. It's just gossip. This shit will blow over." He pauses for another moment, then tells her, "Your career will be fine."

"My career?" She pulls back, brows knit. The words catch in her throat, and she swallows them thickly. "Tony, it's not just… not everything is about my career. I never wanted to be someone's bad decision. I really— _really_ like her. But this is… barely even a relationship. Whatever it is—it's only just started. And already people are trying to ruin it?" Understanding her meaning, he sighs, running a frustrated hand through his hair. "I want it to work," she tells him, adamant.

"So _make_ it work."

She squares her jaw, staring back at him determinedly. _I will,_ she stubbornly thinks. Her entire adult life thus far has been about working for the things that she wants most, pulling opportunities out of thin air. _Why should this be any different?_

Thinking of the blurry photos, the garish headlines, she knows that it _is_ different though. Because in the confines of a hotel room, an arena, or even some arcade in Philadelphia, she and Delphine are just _people_. They belong to themselves, to their friends, to all the people they love. But in the mouth of a journalist, on the page of a magazine, they _don't_. They become caricatures. They belong to everyone who pays for it.

* * *

She leaves the arcade in a hurry, claiming the beginnings of a migraine and an upset stomach. When Delphine offers to leave with her, Cosima's eyes burn abruptly. "I'm just going to nap," she says. "Stay." Relief floods through her when the blonde acquiesces.

In the safety of the van, she smokes two joints, falls into a deep sleep, and later walks into their sound check late, dazed, feeling only marginally more clear-headed come showtime. It has the dull tactile sensation of a dream—rather, some strange vision between conscious and unconsciousness. Her hands don't feel like her own; but they move accordingly, playing through their setlist with rote skill. At some point, she thinks she hears the crowd cheering.

She is quick enough to evade Sarah and Felix afterwards, pawning them off on a concerned yet ever-reliable Tony, who cleverly distracts them with a dubiously labeled bottle of what he insists to be absinthe. Weaving through the corridors, Cosima makes her exit out of the side of the arena, and retreats once again to the van.

Her turntable is as she'd left it, vinyl idling. She drops the needle and falls back into the pile of egg-crate foam and sleeping bags arranged on the floor, still faintly warm from having passed out before the show.

The record plays twice, then begins again. She googles her own name, then the Nautilus moniker. The first page of news results is entirely dominated by articles in which "Cosima Niehaus" and "Nautilus" are preceded by ampersands. In her most popular photo, she's sitting atop the van with Delphine, leaning in for a kiss.

It makes her skin crawl. That moment, as she recalls, had been so heavy, so _intimate._ It had belonged to them—then.

But had it really? How many of their private moments would be tainted by a voyeur's gaze—had already been? What about that first day in the antique shop, or that afternoon at the zoo? Had there been cameras then, too, held furtively in the hands of onlookers who would giggle into the ears of their companions— _"Look—it's_ them _!"_

The record stops, staticky pops filling the void. All Cosima had ever wanted was to be heard. When she was a child she had too many thoughts. They would race in the night, fill her head with a cloying dissonance. There was so much that she needed to siphon out, to release into the world. The verbiage had eluded her, however, and left her in turmoil. It wasn't until she'd picked up an instrument that she'd discovered the means to translate those strange symbols that woke her in the night and overwhelmed her during the day.

Fame had never driven her. Even now, it doesn't factor into the equation. Still, she is only searching for her audience, trying to exorcise herself of her own visions. Still, she is only trying to be heard.

She turns the record over, dropping the needle with care.

" _Oh, Little One, I know you've been tired for a long, long time."_

The van has been cleaned out for their show. Sitting plainly in the corner, beside a suitcase and a pile of notebooks, is her backpack. She still hasn't touched the manila envelope inside.

" _And oh, Little One, I ain't been around for a little while..."_

A tap at the window draws her attention. Through the dark tint, Delphine peeks in, hands cupped over her squinted eyes. She smiles when Cosima looks up.

" _But when you see me:_ wait _."_

The blonde climbs inside the moment she slides open the door, familiar with this innocuous ritual, though they've performed it so few times before. As she settles herself across from Cosima, the record spinning between them, she softly says, "You're not very good at hiding."

The guitarist shakes her head, voice quiet. "Who said I was hiding?"

Delphine shrugs. "You've been acting a little strangely. And you're ignoring your cousin."

"Oh." Cosima pauses, distracting herself. She holds two fingers a hair's breadth above the vinyl, feels the rotation skimming her calluses.

"Tony wants to take us out for a bite to eat. Don't you want to go?"

"I do," Cosima says quickly, finally looking up. She feels guilty and sad, all at once. Tony must be so disappointed in her. "When are they leaving?"

"Five minutes ago," Delphine informs her, causing Cosima to groan. "I told them we'd meet them in a little bit."

"Thanks." She pauses, her stiff fingers trembling.

" _Oh, Little One, I'd tell you good news that I don't believe."_

Her hand spasms, just slightly, disrupting the vinyl. The record skips.

" _If it would help-help you sleep... Strange mercy."_

"I do want to go," she repeats—to a bar where the music is painful-loud, where the bodies radiate heat that stuffs the crevices in your brain like cotton-wool. Where the onlookers will glance at their intertwined hands sidelong, knowing Delphine's name, but not even recognizing Cosima's face. "But maybe we can wait a few minutes."

"Okay." After several seconds, Delphine sighs. "Cosima," she begins. "What's the matter?"

_Everyone knows_ , is the matter. _Everyone knows, and everyone will own us_.

And Cosima can't make sense of it, because when she meets Delphine's gaze, filled with warmth and concern, it all feels so unconditional. It feels like it _belongs_ to her—this moment, this affection—and she can't understand how _anybody_ could look in and lay claim to it.

The confusion tightens her chest. "Existential crisis," she jokes, smiling crookedly. But Delphine doesn't laugh. She merely scoots forwards, cradling Cosima's cheek, studying her eyes with such scrutiny that, for a moment, the brunette is sure that she knows—what's in her backpack, the trashy headlines—all of it.

But then Delphine is frowning, frustrated, though there is fondness around her mouth and eyes. "You're so hard to read sometimes," she says. "I think you do it on purpose."

Cosima swallows, her breath now mingling with Delphine's as the other woman inches closer. "Trust me—I have just as hard of a time with it as you do." The blonde nods slowly, studying her again. Despite what she may claim, Cosima can hardly believe that Delphine can look at her like that and not see every emotion playing out over and under her. She _must._ Whether she understands it is another matter entirely.

"Here," Delphine begins, her other hand holding the back of Cosima's neck. Gently, she captures her lips, mouth molding tenderly over the brunette's. When her tongue darts out, it is languid, unhurried. Cosima is startled by the lack of urgency. Not because she believes Delphine doesn't want her—she knows that is not the case. This kiss is just so much more familiar—meant to calm, and, moreover, to silence her.

It is filled not with lust, but with love.

When Delphine pulls back, she smiles and asks, "Does that help?"

The desperation blooms hungrily in Cosima's belly. It does help—her compassion, her calming warmth—the necessary manner with which she delivers them to her. A kiss such as that is a _gift_ , she knows. One that so few have given to her, one that _she_ has so rarely needed to receive. That Delphine expects nothing in return for it makes the breath stutter in her chest.

There are so many who would like to give these things to Delphine, surely. So many strangers who lay awake at night, posters and pictures with the blonde's face on them pasted to their walls, and construct imaginary lives in which they can do just that. Strangers who would spit on Cosima for taking what they believe they, in their adoration, have some right to.

_They can't have this moment though,_ she thinks. They can't have the fire in Delphine's gaze, the softness of her caress. They can't have the affection that exists between them. But, still, they will try to take it.

So Cosima must take it first.

With a hand fisted in Delphine's wild curls, she pulls the blonde forward, inciting the sense of fervency that had been lacking just a moment before. Her every kiss—from Delphine's mouth, down her jaw and her neck—seeming to say, _"Mine."_ She's overcome with the desire to touch everything—to trace the expanse of ribs, the curvature of spine.

Cosima's teeth sink carefully into the dip where neck meets collarbone, eliciting a soft, surprised gasp. Her hands wander down Delphine's body, grazing the sides of her breasts roughly, without pretense. When she reaches the hem of her shirt, tongue and teeth dragging to the other side of the blonde's neck, her hands dip under, then upward, palms splayed over hot skin.

"Cosima," Delphine half laughs, half pants. "Slow—" Meeting her mouth again, the brunette swallows whatever command had been forming, digging blunted nails into Delphine's belly. The malleability of her body cedes to Cosima's desire, heaving gently into it.

She drags her fingers upwards, grazing the undersides of Delphine's breasts. Mouth moving over the blonde's ear, Cosima takes an earlobe between her teeth. "Take off your shirt," she murmurs, startling somewhat when Delphine pushes her back.

Her face is dark—wanting—as she looks down at Cosima, eyelashes fluttering over an obdurate gaze. Delphine's hands move over top the brunette's, clutching her wrists firmly. The guitarist's heart flutters with sudden anxiety.

"No," the blonde says, her voice low, yet still soft. "You always take control." She removes Cosima's hands from her abdomen, setting them in her lap. "But I want it." The blonde smiles when the other woman licks her lips, eyes widened. " _You_ take _your_ shirt off."

She doesn't hesitate to comply, piece by piece, as Delphine strips her bare with firm, breathy commands. It isn't what she had expected from this encounter, but the newness distracts her, sets her heart to thrumming. The record spins on as she falls back into her makeshift bed, sounding very far away, as if she were hearing it through a wall, or carried on a breeze. Delphine crawls over her on hands and knees, the world dissolving around them.

In her life, it's a feeling she's only thought accessible through an instrument, through the precious melodies that hum deep inside her chest. But when Delphine crests, fingers plucking her string by string, burying sweet, strange arias under her skin with the press of lips, everything else falls away with such uncanny speed that she has to wonder if it were only temporary to begin with.

"When I'm finished," Delphine begins, whispering down the valley between her breasts, the vibrations of her voice palpable. Cosima can feel a faint smile against her skin, the woman's breath hot. "Reading you won't be any trouble at all."

Even without the equipment cases cluttering the floor, the space is compact. Delphine presses into her as if the walls are closing in, her ravenous mouth leaving cherry blossoms on the pale skin of her breast, before closing over a nipple. Her eyes flutter shut of their own accord. When they flicker open again, bright spots swimming in her vision, she can see the fog crawling over the windows.

Cosima breathes her name in a quiet invocation, inhaling a bit sharper when the blonde's mouth moves downward. Her back bows as she peppers Cosima's ribcage with kisses, hand moving between her thighs. Teasingly, Delphine draws a single finger slowly upwards, over the outside of her entrance, ending with a light press over her clit.

She closes her eyes even tighter, gasping. Delphine stills her hand. "Look at me," she says, and Cosima, heart pounding, feels too weak to contest. The blonde's gaze bores into her as she enter her, both their mouths falling open, though the sound catches in their throats.

It happens too quickly. It always does, Cosima thinks. But the syncopation is just so easy, the rhythm perfect. Delphine's spine is bridged over her, her own arching upwards so that her breasts press into the fabric of Delphine's shirt. When she comes, the blonde is sitting up, one arm burning with exertion while the other is hooked beneath Cosima's back. A strangled sound escapes her, and she loses her breath.

Delphine rides it out with her, her own chest rising and falling heavily. She buries her face in the brunette's neck, not kissing, simply enjoying the scent and delicacy of her skin, the cadence of her breathing.

It is several moments before Cosima can speak, her mouth dry, eyes closed. "Can you read me now?"

The blonde tightens her embrace, turning her face a little deeper into Cosima's neck. "Yes," she tells her, with little hesitancy. The brunette doesn't ask, _"What?"_ She simply waits, eyes opening to the dark of the van. "You don't want to be seen," she mutters. "But I see you." Cosima swallows, her heart fluttering. She feels torn between panic and relief.

Delphine's hand moves to the nape of her neck, stroking gently. "You don't have to hide, Cosima. Not from me."

"Not from you," she agrees, shaking her head lightly. Glancing over top Delphine's body, through the window's fog, she can see hazy lights passing in the distance. Outside, there are figures too—faceless and dark, moving over the pavement as little more than shadows. Cosima knows she does not need to hide from Delphine, does not need to fear her. But just because they are together, that does not mean they are safe. Just because nobody is _here_ , that does not mean they are alone.

She holds on tighter.


	18. Eighteen

"DYAD offered me a record deal." She announces it without preamble or aplomb—standing beside her cousin inside Adventure Aquarium's _Hippo Haven_.

Cosima can't meet his eye, opting instead to stare at the 3,000 pound beasts plodding lazily through the tank in front of her. Both hers and Tony's faces are illuminated in the vibrant, jeweled aqua reflecting off the glass in front of them.

"Like a _deal_ -deal?"

Cosima shrugs, admitting sheepishly, "I still haven't looked through the contract yet."

"Shit, dude. They already drew up a contract and everything?"

"Just waiting for the signature," she distractedly tells him, tilting her head in curiosity as one hippo nudges the other playfully in the abdomen. While she thought she might feel some sense of relief at having _finally_ entered this conversation, particularly with a party as neutral as Tony, she feels her interest in it dwindling rapidly.

"Wow…" He whistles slowly, turning back to face the aquarium again before repeating himself. "Wow—yeah. That's legit. Like… _big-bucks_ -legit."

"Probably," she mutters, glancing down at the aquarium leaflet held in her hand. She flips through until she finds the page detailing the hippo exhibit and begins reading, discomfort growing while Tony's mind whirrs with possibilities.

"I mean—think about it. Think about the level of promotion In Vitro have received: TV, radio, magazines—"

Cosima interrupts him with a snort, eyes scanning the brochure. "Button and Genny."

Pausing, Tony raises a brow. "Huh?"

She points into the tank. "Button and Genny—that's their names." Glancing back down at the brochure, she shakes her head. "Aren't hippos like… hella vicious? Like, one of the most violent animals in Africa?"

Baffled more by Cosima's obvious avoidance than by her line of questioning, he shakes his head. "I don't know… I _guess._ "

"Kind of ironic, aren't they?"

"Cos," Tony begins, shaking his head in disbelief, "no offense, but I don't really give a shit about hippos right now. You just told me one of the biggest—if not, _the_ biggest record label in the country—offered you a contract." Cosima stares at him, eyebrows raised as if to ask, _So?_ He throws his hands up in exasperation, an honest grin breaking over his face. "That's, like… amazing!" He pauses, stealing the brochure from her hand. "You know that, don't you?"

After a moment's consideration, she turns from the hippos and sighs, leaning her back against the tank. "I've got mixed feelings about it."

"No shit." Shaking his head with a slight chuckle, he leans against the glass beside her.

"Do you think I'm crazy? For reacting like this?"

"Crazy?" He takes a long moment to consider this, exaggeratedly pulling at the scruff of his chin, deep in thought. "Probably not. Emotionally stunted, however?" She offers him a long-suffering glare, to which he smiles mischievously, the expression softening as he challenges her gaze. "You know, I still think an awful lot about our first tour." He laughs wistfully. "Well… if you can call it that."

After Cosima had dropped out of college, cut off from the support of her parents, she, Felix, and Sarah had skipped town, meeting Tony's band on the East coast. What followed was a hastily arranged string of shows in a collaboration they—thinking themselves so clever—named The Kim Kardashian Sex Tape. Their crudely drawn tour posters had dubbed them a soon-to-be-infamous supergroup— _"Like Blind Faith, only with more crying!"_

Out of the ten shows they'd managed to book, they'd only ended up making it through four.

In two of the clubs, they'd been banned for life, their pictures hung on the entrance walls under the words _"Do not admit!"_ ; three shows they'd gotten so wasted during that neither Cosima or Tony could, to this day, come up with even a piecemeal explanation of what had happened; and during their penultimate performance, they'd been stranded in the desert with a broken down van.

Even now, with the present advances in her career, Cosima's idea of a good time having shifted from all-out debauchery to more laid back partying, those two weeks as the erstwhile Kim Kardashian Sex Tape stand out as some of the most bizarre weeks of her life.

"As I recall, Tone—and I've tried _really_ hard—it's not much to think about."

"I remember most of it."

She raises one eyebrow in disbelief. "Really?"

Tony shrugs. "The important stuff." He laughs then. "What a damn circus. I mean—the balls we had to walk on stage and act the way we did." Cosima cringes. What she does remember isn't entirely pretty. Embarrassing, more like. But she can hardly remember a moment in which she had felt quite as uninhibited as she had in those strange, wasted weeks. "You were impressive though."

She snorts. " _Impressive_ , he says."

"I mean it—it was like… kind of incredible. We hatch this idea over the phone, and within a week, you've booked a small tour, written an _entire_ fucking setlist of weird, Hollywood-topical space songs, and even come up with choreography. You were like a madwoman. And when you'd step on stage… jeez, the rest of us would be laughing our asses off the whole time, but you were so _into_ it. Committed to the performance. You totally owned it. You were like some sort of quasi-schizophrenic-hobo version of Stevie Nicks. I still tell people about it—"

"Tony!" She smacks him on the arm, blushing. "Why the hell would you tell people about that?"

"Because you were phenomenal, dude! Like, if not for the rest of us clowns, the audience totally would've bought it." At her disbelieving stare he throws his hands up. "I'm not kidding." She buries her face in her hands, groaning. "I thought you were brilliant, Cos. I mean—I always kind of figured, but that's when I knew—you could do anything. You could write a song about the grossest, most stupid thing and make it _good._ You could stand on any stage, under any name, and make people believe what you were singing to them. As you long as you had an instrument in your hand."

Tony gets bashful suddenly, looking down to pick at his nails. "We all had big dreams then, you know. We didn't talk about fame so much, but we wanted people to know our names, our music. We all wanted to be in magazines. But out of everyone, including me, you were the only one I ever looked at and thought, _'That one's gonna make it happen.'_ "

After a long pause in which she attempts to tamp down on the lump in her throat, Cosima weakly jokes, "So you do think I'm crazy."

"No. What I think is that there's a big difference between being famous and being a celebrity." He smirks wryly. "Your genius may have been apparent on stage with The Sex Tape, but I'm not sure how well it will translate from some billboard overlooking the Sunset Strip."

"So…" Cosima clears her throat, spinning the rings on her fingers. "You _don't_ think I should take the deal then?"

"Well," Tony shoves his hands into his pockets, exasperated. "DYAD… they are the smart choice, even if they're not the most… _organic_ one." His voice turns wry in his enthusiasm. "I mean—with them, you'd have every advantage in the industry. I'm sure you'd produce some elaborate, sonically masterful album and they'd sell the hell out of it—a trillion copies, easy! And they'd book you an international—" He shakes his head, eyes widening in mock approbation. "—scratch that. _Intergalactic_ tour. You'd be the first artist to play a sold out show on the moon—awarded an honorary Grammy, on the spot. And _that_ would be amazing." Tony swivels around to face her, his Cheshire grin belied by the traces of acumen in his dark brown eyes. "However, I'm not so sure that _amazing_ will be enough to satisfy you."

Cosima's brow furrows. Sarcasm aside, Tony is mostly correct—with DYAD, she'd have boundless resources at her disposal: any instrument she could desire; the best PR in the business; a host of extremely talented managers, producers, and engineers at her beck and call. With advantages such as those, she could easily create the record she's been hearing in her head since high school—the record that has always been just slightly outside of her means, that would most precisely exercise her talents. That record would be convenient.

Cosima just isn't sure if convenience is what she's looking for.

Her dissatisfaction has grown to be a comfort to her, a catalyst. She's never had any room for contentment with the knowledge that she could always do better. And despite the madness it may warrant—the endless frustration at slaving over a sound that is just a hair away from what is playing inside her mind; the exhaustion of all those sleepless nights, trying to create a breathtaking song from thin air; the emotional, mental wear and tear she's so often endured—she's found comfort in the challenge.

She thinks back to the cartoon movies she used to watch as a kid, _Pinocchio_ being one of her favorites. She'd always been fascinated by the scene in which Pinocchio allows himself to be swallowed by the whale.

During those sleepless nights spent inside of the storage unit, toiling over her perfect album, she'd often felt like Pinocchio. The music had been her whale, and she'd allowed herself to be swallowed whole. Her greatest work had come from a sense of exigency, a sense of needing to save somebody, whether it be a friend or herself. All that exhaustion—recording the same strain fifty times with the slightest variation, layering harmony upon harmony to build a wall—had been her tempting the beast to sneeze, to let her go. To create something worth listening to.

In some ways, she'd feared that with the advantages DYAD would afford her, the whale might disappear altogether. What would become of her work then? Of her drive?

"Look," Tony continues, nudging her shoulder, "what I do know in all of this is that my opinion—or Sarah's, or Fee's, or even _Delphine's_ —it doesn't matter. Your opinion is what counts. You know what's best for you." She nods, a bit solemnly. "But, hey—" Tony grins suddenly, cuffing her playfully on the chin. "No matter what you end up deciding, you've got your wise, _handsome_ cousin Tony on your side. Right?"

A slow grin breaking over her face, Cosima nods. "Yeah. I do."

"You take that deal, and I will _gladly_ ride your coattails, Cuz." Cosima chuckles, shaking her head. Tony shrugs then. "But, if you don't… you and I—we can keep partying it up like we always have."

"Like a couple of vagrants."

Tony barks a laugh, throwing his arm around her shoulder, squeezing tightly in his brotherly way. "That's the spirit!"

"No noogies," she yells, wriggling from his grasp. Once she has, she fixes the dreads bundled atop her head, laughing. "You know, I don't think I'd worry half as much as I do if I had you on tour with me all the time."

Tony smirks, knowing exactly where this conversation is headed. "Well, I am pretty great…"

"Seriously, Tone. What would it take to get you to join my band?"

"Christ," he laughs, good-naturedly retorting, "What would it take to get _you_ to stop asking me?"

"A yes."

Tony nods, eyebrow quirked. "Fair enough," he says. Then, after a moment spent stroking his chin, he strolls in the opposite direction. "Maybe soon."

"Wait—what?" She strides quickly past him, walking backwards in the direction of the next exhibit, holding his gaze. " _Soon_?"

He shrugs, sighing. "We've been having a lot of 'group meetings' lately. Serious shit—too much so for my taste. The guys have been thinking it might be time to put the band to rest. Get some _real jobs_." He waves this off dismissively, scowling. They've stopped walking. "Playing in a small-time rock band isn't the best way to make a living, apparently."

Cosima's heart thrums in childlike excitement. "Well, you just say the word, man, and you've got a place in Nautilus. Second guitar, maybe. Dueling solos—" She mimics said solo on air guitar for a moment before Tony throws up his hands, chuckling.

"Hold up, Cos. I've got to figure some shit out before I jump ship, all right? Give me a bit of time."

"All right—yeah." She waves her hands through the air in a mollifying gesture. "Sorry. Take all the time you need."

"We can talk about it again… maybe in a couple weeks. You come back up to Philly for a few days once the tour finishes up, and we'll strike up a deal of our own."

* * *

Later, the band travels to DC, Cosima promising Tony before they part that Nautilus will be back in a week and a half. "Make sure you buy the good weed," she says, slipping a fifty dollar bill into his hand, knowing full well that there is now less than $100 left in her checking account. The numbers are easy for her to ignore.

She's more present during their three hour drive south, choosing to joke with Sarah and Felix while expertly compartmentalizing her anxieties. She finds it's much easier to do so when she can focus on the good that she and Delphine had shared the night before—not just in the van, but in the hotel later, after they'd left the bar Tony had insisted on taking them to.

Part of her had wanted to ravish the blonde until she'd been too physically exhausted to remain awake. However, once back in Delphine's room, they'd decided to lie in bed, watching late night TV in the dark while wearing each other's band t-shirts. They'd talked through whatever show had been playing, the chaste intimacy of it all being somehow more calming to Cosima than the sex had been. She'd fallen asleep, curled into Delphine's side, without trouble.

She feels some sort of distance growing between herself and her fears, safe in the knowledge that, while she doesn't have much time, she can always deal with it tomorrow. Or, at least, that is what she tells herself.

Until they reach DC's Verizon Center, and Rachel Duncan corrals her and Delphine privately into the bus, looking both colder and more self-satisfied than Cosima has ever seen her.

Locking the bus' door behind them, she gestures for Delphine and Cosima to sit at the small kitchenette table. They slide into the bench seat, side by side, glancing curiously at each other. Delphine shrugs, though Cosima can see something like resignation in her eyes.

After an emphatic pause, Rachel takes a seat across from them, a plain folder in hand. "I'm sure you know why we're here right now," the manager says, not deigning to meet their eyes. Instead, she opens up the folder, spreading its contents across the table slowly. Cosima's heart races, stomach dropping as she watches Rachel line up each photo and article on the tabletop. After a calculated moment of silence, she steeples her hands over the tabletop and simply says, "You're in trouble." From the line of her gaze, it's clear the comment is directed more towards Delphine; but she then amends, "You both are."

Cosima wants to know how Delphine is reacting, if there is surprise written across her face. If it is genuine. But she is suddenly too afraid to look. So, instead, she stares ahead at Rachel, heart beating thunderously.

"I feel I would be remiss if I didn't remind you that we _have_ had this conversation before, and that the exact thing I warned you against is what has happened." Her lips quirk into a slight, haughty smirk. "I'm having a rather difficult time finding the irony here."

She slides Mark's interview towards Delphine, tapping the page with a precisely manicured nail. "You've seen this, yes?"

Assuming the question is rhetorical, the drummer fails to answer. When Rachel raises her eyebrows, however, she stutters over a response, "I, uhm—" She glances quickly at Cosima, biting her bottom lip. A bit quieter, she finishes, "—yes."

"Hmm." Rachel nods. "The article is dated just _three_ _days_ after your boyfriend—" She stops herself, the mistake intentional. "I'm sorry—after your _ex_ -boyfriend paid you a surprise visit." She clears her throat. "From which he made a rather hasty exit, I may add. Now—that's not a coincidence, is it?"

Gaze quickly darkening in anger, Delphine shakes her head.

"No—I didn't think so either. And—" She slides the tumblr post containing the photo of Delphine and Cosima towards the guitarist. "Since that visit occurred only days after _this_ photo appeared on the internet, I should probably assume this is all connected." She trains her gaze on Cosima. "What do you think?"

Despite the racing of her pulse, the irritation rises in Cosima. "I think you should cut the shit," she says. Rachel doesn't flinch.

"Excuse me—I just thought that since you've treated this little affair of yours as some sort of game, you might be inclined to humor me. I see though that I was wrong."

"Yeah. You were." There's more that Cosima wants to say—that she wants to argue; but her stomach is twisted painfully and it suddenly feels as if the walls are closing in on them. While Rachel's delivery may be in entirely poor taste, Cosima knows that in some ways she is right. They _were_ given this warning. They _did_ know what was happening around them.

They simply chose to ignore it.

"What do you want us to say," Delphine snaps suddenly, her voice clipped with the same petulant edginess Cosima feels flaming across her cheeks. "I mean—you're the manager. You didn't bring us in here just to taunt us."

"I am and I didn't," Rachel says simply, her tone patronizing. "I was curious how much you knew, to start. Given your reactions, I can only assume the answer to that is _everything._ "

Cosima opens her mouth. _"Not everything,"_ she'd like to insist, but stops herself. What difference do the details make here? The press only care for the bottom line.

"I'm good at my job, Delphine. I think you know that. Cosima, if you don't know that by _now_ , you will. I wouldn't have spoken with you before alerting our PR team. They've already begun damage control. While the publications printing this gossip may not pride themselves on integrity, I suspect they'll still bow once met with libel accusations. The blog post should be down within the next few hours, as well."

" _Libel_ ," Cosima repeats, thrown off kilter by the weight of the word.

"Yes," Rachel says matter-of-factly. "These rumors constitute as defamation—"

"Whoa," the guitarist begins, waving her hands in disbelief, "whoa. Hold on. I don't _like_ any of this. At all. I value my privacy. And while I agree that some of the wording was off, or sort of embellished in a bad way… Delphine and I…" She looks to the blonde finally, her face twisted in a skeptical frown. The drummer, however, can only glance at her, brow pinched, mouth gaping slightly, and struggle for words.

" _Delphine and you_ —what?"

"It's not a lie," Cosima replies, swallowing. "I mean—that shit Mark was slinging about an affair—none of that was true," she asserts. Then, looking to Delphine for confirmation, continues, "You guys were already broken up, you know? So this—it's all been… _proper_ , or whatever."

"And what is _this,_ Cosima," Rachel questions, as if reproaching an unwitting child. Glancing at Delphine for assistance, the blonde seems to be watching her with a surprising amount of anticipation—of hope, perhaps—and an equal amount of apprehension.

The guitarist laughs, somewhat sardonically. "A relationship." It should be the most apparent thing—though they haven't exclusively spoken about it before. Her mind flashes with images of Delphine the night prior, hovering over her in the van, holding her as if to anchor. They're not kids—they don't _need_ labels. Some things are just obvious.

Yet, Delphine's eyes widen, nevertheless, the hope and anxiety in them growing in tandem.

"Really?" Rachel looks to the drummer, Cosima's gaze soon following.

Unwavering, Delphine looks to her manager, brow furrowing a bit deeper and answers, resolutely, "Yes."

Cosima nods, heart fluttering through the nerves still twisting her stomach. "Yeah."

"Well, you can't say that," Rachel tells them.

"Why not?"

The manager sighs exasperatedly. "Your relationship—"

"Is not anyone's business but our own," Cosima finishes for her. She grabs Delphine's hand under the table, the blonde squeezing back immediately. "We don't need to issue a public statement, for crying out loud." She swallows, shaking her head. "Why would we? That's ridiculous. _However,_ that doesn't mean we need to keep it a secret either."

Rachel stares at her for a long moment, gaze cool. "You really are oblivious to this industry, aren't you?"

The unexpected affront of the question knocks her off guard. "What?"

"It's been two months since the release of In Vitro's second album. That's two months that they've managed to maintain _three_ songs in the nation's biggest singles charts. Two months of unprecedented album sales, sold out concerts, and effusive praise from a host of critics. If this sort of adulation continues—and believe me, the DYAD team will work tirelessly to make it—In Vitro will likely make a clean sweep come awards season.

"That sort of success is truly… exceptional. And while you may not think so, I can assure you, any sort of attack on public image _will_ jeopardize that." Rachel pauses, shaking her head. "I know what critics are saying about Nautilus. It's _nice,_ truly. But the kind of fame _you've_ accrued is just not of the same caliber. Not even close—"

"Rachel," Delphine cuts in, incensed. "Don't say that—"

"It's true," Cosima interjects, voice flat. Silence settles between them. "I'm not bothered by _that._ In Vitro and Nautilus run in two completely different circles. I understand." She swallows, jaw clenching. "But, I mean—this isn't the Stone Age," she laughs bitterly. "Delphine and I… I don't see why that's such a damn problem." She runs a hand through her dreads, offense flaring. "—Why us being together should _defame_ the band."

"Cosima," Rachel begins, and for the first time since they sat down at the table, the complacency falls from the manager's demeanor, sincere belief taking its place. "It's nothing personal."

The guitarist blinks, slowly facing Delphine, who turns between the two of them, mouth parted slightly. _Torn._ Cosima can see it plainly in her gaze, the anxiety and hope she recognized before now completely at odds with each other. It pains them both.

Finally, Delphine looks to her, takes a breath, and says, in a voice too small to be believed, "This is the business."

Taking a breath of her own, Cosima calmly says, "Get up."

"Cosima—"

"I said _get up_."

"Why?"

"Because I'm not going to sit here and listen to this bullshit," she snaps, voice raised. Delphine flinches. For a brief moment, Cosima thinks she will try to argue, to appease her; but then the drummer stands, shamefaced. Cosima brushes off the hand she attempts to lay on her arm.

She's more than halfway across the parking lot before Delphine calls after her. "Cosima—wait!" She quickens her pace, but still, the blonde is faster. She grabs her arm, the brunette wheeling around immediately, wearing a sulky expression. "Please… let's talk about this."

"Talk?"

Delphine tugs on her arm, sighing in a mixture of exasperation and guilt. "Yes."

A mirthless smile crawls over Cosima's face, a torrent of anxiety, irritation, and disappointment gushing forth in one cool admission. "Leekie offered me a recording contract."

Whatever Delphine had been expecting, this certainly isn't it. Her eyes widen, lips parting in surprise. Licking her lips, Cosima turns away, unable to read the range of emotions playing over the drummer's features.

As she's about to step away, Delphine tugs on her arm again, more insistently. "Cosima," she says in shock, "When did—" Her hold slackens just slightly. "That meeting the two of you had—that was when, wasn't it?" Jaw squared, the brunette turns back to her and nods. Delphine wraps her tightly in her arms then, without hesitation, taking Cosima off guard. "Merde." She kisses the guitarist's temple, half laughing. "That's wonderful."

After briefly returning her embrace, Cosima extricates herself from Delphine's arms, tamping down on her composure. "I haven't made a decision yet," she says, awkwardly crossing her arms over her chest.

"Oh." Delphine takes a breath, the excitement fading quickly from her face. She asks, "Are you sure about that?"

Eyes narrowing slightly, Cosima says, "Yeah, I'm sure. Still have a lot to consider."

"Right," the blonde nods. Taking a step forward, her face lighting with a strained smile, she offers, "If you need someone to vent to, I'll gladly listen. I've been through the whole process before, so…" The explanation trails off, Cosima nodding in response. She clears her throat, staring down at her feet as Delphine drifts closer to her. "Cosima," she begins, leaving only inches of space between them.

The brunette glances up to meet her gaze, reticent. "Yeah?" Already she can see the hurt, the vulnerability in which Delphine's eyes are fringed.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

The shame is instant, her vindication rising in tandem with it. "Why didn't _you_ tell me about the articles," she retorts. "You obviously knew before me. I was completely in the dark until Philly."

Delphine's eyes round in surprise, understanding. "So—your _headache_?"

Cosima nods. "Yeah."

"I didn't want to talk about—" Delphine begins.

"Clearly."

"No," the blonde insists, clutching her hands in her own. "Mark and I… we were so reserved, for so long—years. Even when we were made public, nobody cared. I'd gotten used to the fans' indifference. With you, it's just not the same. When we're together—it's so hard to have reservations. And maybe that's foolish. People are already talking… _already._ " She runs a hand incredulously through her hair. "I couldn't believe that. I can't stand it. And I just wanted to…" Delphine struggles for the right word.

" _Pretend_ ," Cosima finishes for her, tone bitter.

"No—Cosima," the blonde sighs, exasperated. "It wasn't about pretending. It was about ignoring all of…" Delphine throws her hands up in frustration, "this bullshit. Fucking magazines and nosey fans and intrusive industry people. Make no mistake—I _did_ sign up for this, but I _do not_ like it. I just know how to _accept_ it."

After a pause, Cosima asks, "And that's all this is? Acceptance?"

"Yes." Her tone turns mildly reproachful then as she clutches Cosima's hand in her own. "That's just what you have to do."

Maybe it's the child in her—the defiant adolescent who refused to be told she couldn't spend entire days in her basement with a guitar in hand, who rejected proms and teen parties, who smoked blunts a door down from her parents without concern—the stubborn child that makes Cosima want to snap, _"I don't have to do anything."_

But then Delphine is sighing again, her eyes sad. She tucks an errant curl meekly behind her ear. "I'm on your side," she says quietly. "You know that? I _don't_ like this." She shakes her head. When she meets Cosima's gaze, her expression is a bit harder, more resolute. "This _is_ my world though."

_And it could be mine, too_ , Cosima thinks, looking into Delphine's eyes. The smile that pulls at the corners of her mouth is as stanch as the tension that stiffens the blonde's spine.

"Yeah," she says, nodding. "And it's nothing personal."


	19. Nineteen

_Delphine stands in the open doorway of Leekie's office, knocking gently on the frame. "Aldous," she calls, the man lifting his gaze from the stacks of paper strewn across his desk, a bright smile on his face. "May I come in?"_

" _Of course! I've been waiting for you." He half rises from his plush leather chair, his spindly frame wreathed in the bright, yellow sunshine pouring in from the city backdrop. "Please—take a seat," he tells her, pointing to one of the chairs across from him. Smiling, Delphine does as she's told. "Can I offer you a drink?"_

" _No, thank you. I've had quite enough this past weekend."_

_The manager chuckles. "Rightfully so. From what I understand, the festival was another great success."_

" _I think so," Delphine nods._

_Aldous waves her off. "No need for modesty. Not here." Grinning, he shuffles a few of the papers on his desk, eyes lighting when he finds what he was looking for—a newspaper. Folding the paper back to the right page, he hands it across the desk. "You're the talk of the town."_

_Despite the few years of industry experience she's accrued, Delphine still blushes at the garish headlines, the sight of herself on the page of a major publication._

" _Hard to believe," she says, voice dry._

_Aldous laughs, mistaking her veiled self-deprecation for pride. "Consider it a warmup for the tour. With publicity like this, I wouldn't be surprised if every date sells out."_

_Delphine raises her brows slightly, head tilting. The thought already exhausts her. "That would be nice, wouldn't it?" With a smile that doesn't quite touch her eyes, she hands the newspaper back to him. "Actually, the tour is what I wanted to talk with you about."_

" _Oh?" Curious, he steeples his hands over the desk._

" _Yes. Just a small matter, really."_

" _Well—by all means. I always appreciate your input, Delphine."_

" _Thank you." Her smile tightens. She glances away for a moment in an attempt to adopt a more genuine expression; however, her gaze catches on the line of In Vitro records on the wall, on her own photo. She takes a deep breath, turning back to Aldous without preamble. "The opening act," she begins. "We're still looking, aren't we?"_

" _We are," he replies, sinking back into his chair._

" _I know who it should be." He quirks an eyebrow inquisitively. Smile softening in sincere excitement, Delphine takes out her cellphone, pulling up a few of the articles she'd searched in preparation. "Nautilus," she tells him, holding out her phone._

_He shakes his head. "I've never heard of them."_

" _Well, it's one woman, really. And a backing band." He takes the phone, scrolling through the article with a somewhat listless expression. "They were at the festival, too. I met her. She was…"_

Phenomenal _, Delphine thinks. It had been_ years _—since she was a teenager perhaps, since her first concert—that a musician had captivated her in the way Cosima Niehaus had. She couldn't quite identify why. There was the technical wonder, of course—the woman was a talented multi-instrumentalist whose harmonies had left Delphine reeling ever since, attempting to pick them apart piece by piece. Her presence, too, was commanding in a way that the blonde had often assumed could only come from decades of experience._

_As far as Delphine could tell though, there was something else there. While all those things on the surface had thrilled her, there was more to it than that. Some other, stronger variable—a complex ecosystem of emotion and intellect hidden beneath—that had entranced her._

" _I'll be sure to give her a listen," Aldous promises, sliding her phone back across the desk._

_Blinking from her reverie, Delphine continues, "You trust my judgment, don't you?"_

_He chuckles. "I do."_

_After a measured pause, meeting the manager's gaze directly, she says, "I want her on this tour."_

* * *

In the past, she'd only ever wanted to hold or be held. In the early morning, with the pale sun streaming through the blinds in luminous ribbons, it had been easier to look anywhere but their faces. Wrapped in the gauze of daybreak, they had blended together—Mark and all the men that had preceded him. She had loved each of them—in such a way that they had left vague, enduring impressions between her ribs—but she had always been content to look away.

Maybe that is the difference now, Delphine thinks. With all the others, she had been on the brink of forgetting, even in those earlier moments, when she had been committing their bodies, their personalities to memory. She had held them loosely, whatever ties that bound them slipping marginally with each wasted morning. She had been ready to let go.

She had been in control.

In spite of the careful arrangements that she's made, however, ensuring that Cosima would end up on this tour, at her side, in her bed—control is never something that she has had. She may have stacked the dominoes, but hers is not the hand that will set them tumbling.

She can't look away. As Cosima lies curled next to her, bottom lip flapping faintly with each small exhale, her shoulders bare but for the light that swathes them, Delphine knows this. Her heart hammers hard enough that she feels as though it is attempting to split from her.

" _It's nothing personal,"_ Cosima had said. But she couldn't understand—not the necessity of reservation, of her compliance to the industry that had made her; not the ways in which the public would draw them from the safety of this room, twist their words and their affections, and make their relationship into something it was not.

She couldn't even understand that, despite the things Delphine might say—the persona she might adopt in the limelight, or in the company of Rachel Duncan or Aldous Leekie—she could never really _mean_ any of those things.

Because she loves Cosima.

Maybe from that first afternoon, when she had watched Nautilus playing at the festival, standing in the press pit, front row, feeling stupidly as if the guitarist was playing just for her.

But she's afraid, too. Because their lives, their worlds are separate. Maybe not in this moment, in this hotel bed, as she traces the contours of the brunette's jaw with her thumb. These are the secret moments in which trajectories converge, and pretending is easy—the moments in which one squints into the darkness, eyes lidded from exhaustion, and makes plans they could never dare to utter. A moment where one could build a house, or make a date, or even write a vow. But Delphine knows from experience, these moments aren't made to last.

_She's_ _better than me_ , she thinks. _And she's such a fool._ Cosima—steadfast, stubborn, and childishly idealistic—living in a van, making bedroom records for highbrow critics whose praise can't even pay her bills. She would never give up on her dreams, Delphine knows.

Delphine, who gave up on her own a long time ago.

"Wake up—Cosima." She presses the tips of her fingers into the woman's cheek, her heart beating erratically. Peppering her brow with kisses, she insists, "Wake up."

* * *

_She never feels more homesick than the instant when the key is turning, when she hears the bolt slide back and the door swings open. It's then, standing in the threshold of her own apartment, the silhouettes of furniture blanketed in the dark, that she longs for the house she left behind years ago._

_Despite these mild pangs—a distant irritation now—Delphine doesn't think about it much anymore. Like all those other nights between tours and galas and press junkets, she sets her purse down on the table by the door, hangs her keys on the hook, and kicks off her shoes. She doesn't linger on the gnawing quiet that envelops the penthouse._

_Her parents' suburban cookie-cutter, though sometimes overly coiffed and conservative, had been a home. In the spring and summer, Maman had tended to the flowerbeds with the kind of overbearing attentiveness that she'd shown to Delphine in her youth. While the girl was at school, she'd spend hours daily kneeling in the dirt, her hands sunken into the soil; or later, after they'd been thoroughly cleaned, kneaded into dough. She had been a homemaker, through and through, and while Delphine had often resented her for it, she'd grown accustomed to the comforts it had afforded her._

_She misses coming home to the arresting scent of cinnamon and sugar, hints of her father's tobacco clinging high in the air. She misses the warmth of a dozen candles burning; or of the resonant, hourly peals of the antique clocks that adorned the walls. She misses the feeling of solitude that was so readily available to her, when she'd sit in her bedroom with the window open, smoking a cigarette she'd pilfered from her mother's purse._

_She could never hate her parents, but in her teens, she'd perceived Maman as epitomizing everything she despised about adulthood. Mrs. Cormier was demure; ephemeral in personality, often altering her bearing according to company; and subservient by choice. She was a wife, a mother, and in Delphine's mind, little else._

_Walking into the kitchen, the blonde pulls a fresh bottle of wine from the rack, uncorking it with routinely ease. She foregoes the expensive, crystal glasses in the cabinet for an extra-large coffee mug she'd picked up in a hotel gift shop her first time in Vegas, filling it three quarters of the way. Her eyes flutter shut at the first sip of Merlot—another esteemed vintage, though they all tend to taste the same to her._

_Her parents had initially been appalled by her choice of career._ "A musician," _Maman had cried, with a hyperbolic expression that bordered on comical. It was everything she hadn't wanted for her daughter._ "Who do you think you're fooling with that put-on attitude, Delphine? They'll see right through you. You're too sensible for this kind of lifestyle."

_As it turned out, her sensibility had worked in her favor. Like Maman, she'd been able to alter her personality in the right company, to put on a different face and play her strengths. She'd been able to charm businessmen and journalists and fans alike. If she was bashful, it only made her more enigmatic, more appealing to those who hungered for knowledge of her personal life. She was compliant when necessary, when public image demanded it._

_It only struck her long after the fame had set in that, in spite of the radically different, more tempestuous nature of her career, she'd managed to become the exact person Maman had wanted her to be—Maman, herself._

_She was a musician, but her life was not wild. This career, she'd found, was not as it had been depicted in films and books. Though In Vitro might play in sold out arenas, though their instruments were loud, and they lived in and out of suitcases and buses, it was not rock and roll. Still, the masses loved it._

_Delphine lingers by the electric piano set up against the far wall. Hitting the power button, her right hand falls over the keys, playing a slow, childhood melody. Taking another sip of her wine, she sets the mug on the desk beside the piano, where her computer sits. Next to the keyboard and a stack of neatly ordered folders, there sits a copy of Nautilus' first LP. She holds it up to the lamp, studying the cover with more intensity than she had the last few times she'd listened to it._

_In Vitro's records always have their faces on them—if not on the front, then on the back. Nautilus' is covered in colorful, geometric artwork in tones of deep purple and burgundy. Curious, she cracks open the jewel case and slides out the thin booklet inside. The first five pages are entirely lyrics; the last, however, includes a single dedication:_ "For Conrad—I'm giving them hell, you old bastard."

_Delphine smirks, eyes falling on the picture of Cosima beside it. Rock and roll this may be, but the brunette grins toothily, nonetheless, cramped in the back of what appears to be a van, joint held between her teeth._

That's real, _Delphine thinks, remembering how their own photographers had instructed them to pout—how Mark had told her it was better not to smile._

_She looks back down at the keyboard, hand sprawled over the keys. After a moment's hesitation, she opens up the desk drawer and stuffs Nautilus' record inside. She plays until she can no longer keep her eyes open, her mind abuzz.  
_

* * *

Cosima's defiance shames her as much as it astounds her. Even as the brunette takes Leekie's hand in her own, shakes it firmly with what Delphine believes to be a genuine smile, the warning is apparent in her gaze. Like a cat, she thinks—all beauty and poise braced for an attack. If Aldous notices, he says nothing, greeting her with unabashed gratification. The pleasantries, something the blonde is typically so well-versed in, make her skin crawl tonight.

When the brunette laughs, it is with the timbre of someone else's voice. Her hands, too, which usually flutter wildly before her, unrestrained, are now stilled at her front. Delphine can see the way they itch to move, Cosima's fingers drumming agitatedly against the knuckles of her other hand in anticipation.

Part of her thinks, _this is good. She can play the part, if she wants to. She can fake it._

_She can be like me._

And while this should bring Delphine some sense of relief—to know that her place in this industry does not signify a lack of integrity—not if Cosima can so easily succumb to it, as well—the other part of her can't help but feel unbearably indignant.

* * *

" _Can we talk about it," she asks, the room dark save for the light of the cityscape breaking in from behind the curtains._

" _We're denying it," Cosima answers, too matter-of-factly, tugging the duvet up to her chin as she buries her face in the pillow._

" _You're content to do just as Rachel tells you to?" She stares at the window, eyes seeking the faint shapes of buildings, skyscrapers behind the thin fabric. In the distance, a siren blares, the bullhorn of a fire engine cutting through traffic. How distant and untouchable disaster always seems to be in the quiet of night._

" _She knows better."_

" _Maybe." Sighing, Delphine rolls over, facing Cosima. "That wasn't what I meant though." The brunette opens her eyes slowly, peering at Delphine with a squinted gaze. "Aldous will be expecting an answer tomorrow."_

_Cosima's eyes narrow. "I know." She pauses, rolling dramatically onto her back. "I've been thinking about it—trust me. Like… non-stop."_

" _Well, why won't you just—" Shaking her head, Delphine rolls onto her back, too, eyes on the ceiling. "Never mind."_

" _What?"_

" _It's not—"_

" _No." Dropping the edge to her voice, Cosima pushes herself up onto her elbow, looking down at Delphine with a tender nervousness. "I'm sorry. Just tell me," she says, stroking Delphine's cheek with the tips of her fingers._

" _I just wish, instead of driving yourself crazy thinking about, you would talk to me instead." Cosima's fingers stutter for a moment, brow furrowing. Delphine looks up at her, eyes unguarded, entreating._

" _It's not you," Cosima says quietly, shaking her head._

_Delphine holds her bicep. "Then what is it?"_

" _I'm not good with big decisions like this—especially not when they involve other people. I tend to blow it." The brunette smirks. When she finds no returning expression from Delphine, she falters. "I mean, if you're nervous about something, you're_ supposed _to talk about it. That's what people always say, but… I don't know. I've always just kind of felt like, if you give it a voice, it becomes real. Whereas thoughts are a bit more—"_

" _Silent?" Delphine raises an eyebrow._

" _Well," Cosima quirks her head, "yeah."_

" _So, you prefer to just play dead. And wait for the bear to wander away."_

_After a pause, she sarcastically remarks, "I tend to think of it as being a bit more_ courageous _than that."_

_Delphine snorts, despite herself, Cosima chuckling with her. "Except DYAD is not a bear. It will not kill you."_

" _I'm not saying that."_

" _Because you're not saying anything." She grips Cosima's bicep a little tighter. "But that's a message, too." The brunette glances down, twisting the sheets around her fingers. "It's not all about idealism, you know. Sometimes a career is just a career."_

_Cosima shakes her head again. "I don't think that's true though. I mean—maybe—if you_ let it _be_. _" She smiles sadly. "Who told you you couldn't change the world?"_

" _What?" She releases the brunette's bicep, taken off guard by the suddenness of the question._

" _How old were you? When they told you you couldn't change the world?" After a pause, she presses, fingers drawing swirling patterns in Delphine's cheek. "I'm not kidding. I wanna know."_

" _I don't," Delphine answers honestly, frowning in confusion. "Everyone is told that, at some point. Because it's—it's rational."_

" _Is it though? I mean—when you're a kid, your parents tell you that you could be any amazing thing you want to be. That you could_ do _anything—you could change the world if you just work hard enough. But then—I don't know—ten? Fifteen?—years later, they turn around and tell you that it's just…_ not practical. _So—why even say it to begin with?"_

" _I don't know."_

_She shrugs. "Neither do I. It's kind of fucked up. You know how many people, like, totally abandon all of their principles the moment someone_ wiser _than them tells them they're being impractical? Why is that such a_ scary _thing?"_

" _This coming from the romantic pragmatist."_

_Cosima rolls her eyes, fondly telling her, "Don't change the subject." She sighs. "The only reason more people_ aren't _changing the world is because they don't believe they can. They give up—way too early."_

" _Not you?"_

" _I'm not afraid of being impractical," Cosima tells her, voice soft though her eyes are hard._

_And Delphine knows, in this moment, that_ she _is_. _She is very afraid—that she'll never be like Cosima, who is brave and stupid and content—that Cosima will realize it._

" _Maybe it's just music," the brunette continues, settling down on her side again, hand returning to Delphine's cheek. "I've been told that, too. Like it's no big deal. But there's people out there who really need it." She pauses. With her own gaze fixed on the ceiling, she can feel Cosima's eyes boring into her neck. "I just don't want anybody telling me how I'm supposed to give it to them."  
_

* * *

"After your set, I would love to buy you a drink, Cosima. Maybe even a bite to eat?"

Delphine is chatting quietly with Beth and Felix when she hears Aldous ask it. Against her better judgment, she turns her head, watching as the manager drifts closer to the brunette, one hand in his pocket while the other rests warmly on Cosima's shoulder. He bows his head towards hers, grinning in that easy, disarming way of his. That countenance had won a contract from her and her bandmates with little effort.

With a challenging smirk of her own, Cosima asks, "Trying to butter me up?"

Aldous laughs. "Maybe I am. And I know just the place to go. Excellent food, relaxed atmosphere—perfect place to make a deal."

"We'll talk," Cosima agrees, face inscrutable. "You might want to _actually_ see me play though before making any commitments."

"This is true." He straightens his posture, hand dropping from her shoulder. His gaze rakes over her in a way that makes Delphine's hands twitch in discomfort. "I have a feeling you won't let me down though."

"Oh." She smiles, catching the blonde's unabashed stare out of the corner of her eye for a split second. It's the first time during this entire encounter that the guitarist's composure wavers, hints of anxiety showing through. Cosima shakes it off, turning back to Aldous. Without a trace of irony, she tells him the exact thing she told Delphine the day that they met, the day of the festival. "I'll knock your socks off."

Delphine is certain then, as she turns back to Felix and Beth, stomach roiling with secondhand nerves, that Cosima is going to do exactly what she warned her she would the night before: she's going to blow it.

_Purposely,_ the blonde tells herself. That has to be what is happening. Why else would she smile so genuinely with Leekie? Speak so freely in his company? With Cosima, these sorts of airs are never without calculation, intent. She's the type to prove a point, after all, even at her own expense.

That day in the bar—the day she and Mark went on their break—hadn't Cosima told her just that? She would ruin herself to maintain a sense of integrity.

Of course, that same day, she'd also insisted how very full of surprises she was.

Later, Delphine chews her own lip bloody, standing in the dark of the wings while Nautilus perform their last set of the tour. Cosima is quiet as she steps up to the mic, foot ghosting over a number of pedals. For a moment, she looks as if she will say something—some small, cheeky introduction, as she is so often wont to give. Instead, she smiles, looking back at Sarah and Felix for affirmation. With a nod, she counts off into the first song, hammering into it with unmatched confidence.

By the time they have finished their final song, Delphine's heart is pounding, her jaw slackened by the flawlessness, the purpose with Cosima has played. She has seen the brunette play _great_ shows before, but the conviction in her voice as she sings tonight strikes the blonde as being more focused, rawer than she has ever heard.

If Aldous Leekie had any doubts about their partnership before, they will surely have dissipated in the frisson of the hungry crowd, their hands reaching for her over the barrier, seeking a piece of the woman who believes she _can_ change the world.

* * *

" _A toast,"_ _Aldous begins, his smile bright as he holds his champagne flute aloft, her bandmates raising their own dutifully. With some hesitance, licking her lips in anticipation of drink—of washing away the oddly stale taste of caviar from her mouth—Delphine lifts her glass, as well._

"Another _one?"_

" _Paul," Leekie chides, tsk-ing at the man beside him, who's own playful smile is somehow simultaneously honest and entirely disingenuous. "I'll forgive that comment since we're still getting to know each other. You'll come to expect this in time."_

" _He's just being impatient," Beth teases, nudging Paul in the ribs. Art, smirking beside them, can only roll his eyes._

" _Where's the fire, Mr. Dierden? We have all the time in the world."_

_Delphine tunes out their banter entirely when Paul makes some remark on the exorbitance of the bubbly in his glass, Aldous ready with one of his cunning ripostes. It's not necessarily because the blonde feels annoyed by them, or otherwise uncomfortable playing a part in their back-and-forth. Mostly, she's just tired. Inexplicably exhausted in a way that weights her limbs, causing her to sink heavily at night into dreamless sleep._

_It begins to feel rote—the movement of Aldous' lips as his speech comes tumbling forth, punctuated with coy smirks and carefully plotted pauses; the calculated laughter of her bandmates; the bright_ clink _of their glasses as they delicately collide, followed by a self-satisfied "hear hear". Delphine can't hear herself when she speaks, when she chuckles with perfect timing. She can barely even taste the champagne on her tongue, but knows when the glass is empty, can feel the heaviness of her hands as she refills it._

_She stands by the floor-to-ceiling window, tinted darkly to protect her from prying eyes, and sweeps her gaze languidly across the skyline. As the sun sets, the cityscape winks to life—a slowly awakening beast, yawning tiredly into the horizon. It comes to life in the form of thousands of blinking lights, peppering the grid with luminescent pinpricks in yellow, greens, reds._

" _This is your city now," Leekie says smoothly, sidling up next to her. Leaning over her shoulder, close enough that she can smell the musk of his aftershave, he points in the direction of Hollywood Boulevard. "Over there—you see? That's my favorite billboard," he chuckles to himself. "My_ lucky _billboard. Every time we get one of our artists up there, they've got a platinum record within three months." She glances over at him, eyebrow raised in incredulity. "I swear," he says, throwing his hands up. "Every time—without fail."_

_Her eyebrows climb into her hairline for a brief moment before she shakes her head, taking a sip of her drink. "That seems like a while off."_

" _Does it?" The question is honest. She looks over at him, nodding modestly. His head tilts to the side as he studies the skyline, gaze scrutinizing. "Might just be a matter of perspective. From where I'm standing, it seems perfectly within our reach now." He pauses, smiling wistfully. "You'll be surprised by how quickly things begin moving from here on out. Today—signing the contract, popping the champagne—this is only the beginning. And it might seem very calm now, in this room, but behind the scenes, there's already been a flurry of activity."_

_Delphine gulps down her next sip, hand tightening around her glass. She'd already thought they'd been moving quickly—with the endless stream of gigs, the sleepless nights, the promotional work. Her perch within DYAD's walls feels suddenly vertiginous; herself, very small. It could be so easy to get swept away._

_She had signed up for that, yes. There is so much she has to prove, to so many people. And now that she is in it, she wouldn't turn back even if she could. However, that doesn't mean that the unknowns of the coming months don't set her heart to thrumming in her chest._

" _The wheels were greased after our first meeting." Draining his glass, Aldous turns to her and winks, placing a hand on her shoulder. "From here on out it's just… smooth sailing."_

" _Thank you, Aldous. I don't—" She hesitates for a moment before settling on the truth. "I don't know what's to come. I mean—I can't imagine what it will be like. But it's going to be—"_

" _The time of your life," he finishes for her._

_Nodding enthusiastically, she says, "Yes. Yes—the time of our lives." She laughs then, both frightened and exhilarated. "I can promise you, we will work very hard," she assures him, her tone resolute._

_Aldous chuckles, waving her conspiratorially towards him with an impish grin. "I'll let you in on a little secret, Delphine." Playing along, she leans tentatively forward, feeling somewhat uneasy, somewhat buzzed. "_ You don't have to. _" The blonde pulls back, Aldous laughing genuinely. "That's the beauty."_

_She smiles. "Is it?"_

_The manager's grin softens knowingly, voice oozing confidence as he says, "You'll see." After a moment, appraising her, he turns slowly, pointing at her as he walks away. "It won't be long. You'll see everything."_

_As Delphine turns back to face the window, however, the only thing she can see is herself, blinking thickly in the glass, silhouetted by a blurring city. "Smile," she whispers softly to her reflection, its visage disintegrating in the neon of the flickering entertainment district. In spite of this demand, her face remains vacant—unconvinced.  
_

* * *

It seems ironic how utterly forgettable this extraordinary life of hers is. She is afforded, daily, experiences that most people can only lay awake at night dreaming about—experiences that those working nine to five jobs fantasize about out of a need for distraction. If only they could understand the banality of it all—the facelessness of the people who _love_ her; the emptiness of every bed, every hotel room; the intransigency of life on the road, sliding in and out of cities, the destination always fleeting. If they could understand how fickle it all truly is, perhaps they may not envy her so viciously.

Every day is so similar that it is often difficult to find a foothold, to plant herself and commit any of it to memory. The people are without names. The scenery lacks definable architecture. Aldous had once promised her the time of her life, but she finds it passing without measure, without quietude. She fears she won't be able to remember a single detail twenty years from now.

Odd then, that she can remember exactly what Cosima had been wearing on the first day that they met. That she can remember what she'd eaten for breakfast on the first morning of tour, Cosima sitting nervously across from her, trying not to meet her eyes. That she can remember what color gum was stuck to the bottom of her shoe the day Cosima had taken her to the zoo.

Months later, she will remember the article she is reading in _The New York Times,_ the red wine stain on the sleeve of her shirt when Cosima walks into the green room the last night of tour and says, "I made a decision."

Delphine lifts her head, eyes wide in anticipation. Cosima watches her, too, standing just inside of the doorway, looking unmoored, her hands limp at her sides.

"I had dinner with Leekie," she continues, her initial aplomb having receded into the quiet of the room.

"Yes," Delphine says, because she knows this. It's not the story she's been waiting for. But as the silence hangs between them, the brunette suddenly spinning the rings on her fingers, it dawns on her.

"He's not so bad, I guess. He was very… generous."

"Generous," she repeats. "Definitely." She folds the paper, tossing it haphazardly to the end of the coffee table.

"He took me to this swanky restaurant—gave me the spiel." She paces nervously, rounding the coffee table. "The wine was… wow. I could've drank—"

"Cosima." Delphine looks up at her, a sudden spike of irritation shooting through her belly. _"Just tell me,"_ she means to say, but then Cosima meets her gaze, and the blonde can see the guilt, the relief, the petulant defiance washing over her. "You actually turned him down." Cosima looks away, and she sinks back into the couch, incredulous. "Didn't you?"

The guitarist's mouth opens and closes a couple of times before she lifts her chin proudly, jaw tight. "This was always what it was going to be." Then, as an afterthought, she adds, "You had to have known that."

Delphine can almost accept it until she hears Cosima laugh at herself. "You couldn't even _entertain_ the thought?" The brunette merely stares at her, innocence painted on, and shrugs, stoking Delphine's indignation anew. "It's so easy for you, isn't it? The deal of a lifetime—" Delphine runs a hand through her hair, sweaty and tangled from her earlier performance. "—He hands it to you on a silver platter and you scoff at it. Like it's nothing."

Cosima's eyes narrow suddenly, and she steps back. "Hold on." She laughs again, defensive. " _You're_ mad at me?"

"I'm—" Delphine balks, unable to understand the surge of emotion she feels. "Yes. _But_ —" She cuts off Cosima's retort, continuing with a sharper voice. "I'm only angry because you—are _hurting_ yourself, Cosima."

" _Hurting_ _myself_ —"

"Yes," she insists, finally standing. When she nears the brunette, the other woman stiffens. "You could have everything. Your career—"

"I don't care," Cosima interjects, sidestepping her.

"You're being childish!"

" _Childish?_ " Cosima turns back to look at her, the vexation plain on her face. "Me?" She laughs mordantly, shaking her head. "Just how deep in denial are you that you've actually convinced yourself that _this_ is everything? That you _like_ this life?"

Delphine huffs, her spine stiffening. A hot blush sears across her clavicle, up her neck. "I want for nothing," she says lowly. "Not in my career. Not… at home." The words sound hollow coming out of her mouth. Cosima can only purse her lips, shaking her head. She _knows._ Swept away in her pride, however, Delphine continues. "People _love_ me."

After a beat, the brunette takes a breath. "And you hate it."

Biting back the tears she feels threatening, Delphine spits, "You don't know." She shakes her head, turning away. "You're just making assumptions."

"You don't believe that."

At this she turns back, pointing a finger accusatorily. "Don't tell me what I believe." She pauses, feeling herself begin to shake. "You're so self-righteous. That's what this is all about—that's why you didn't take the deal."

"Oh—you _really_ wanna know why I didn't take the deal?"

"Yeah. I do."

"Because of you," Cosima roars back, pointing a finger of her own.

"Me?" Delphine laughs, too, walking across the room.

"Yeah—because I didn't want to be like you."

The blonde plants herself in the middle of the room, halted by Cosima's words. Slowly, she turns to face her again. "What am I like," she asks quietly, hiding the quiver in her voice. The guitarist pales slightly.

"Like… everything is pretend."

"Pretend?"

"Yeah," Cosima glances down at her feet, wringing her hands. Her next words come more quietly. "Like, you can't stand the sight of yourself on the cover of a magazine. You can't stand your fancy tour bus or the autographs you have to sign. You can't stand your music." She glances up, meeting Delphine's stony gaze. Cosima herself seems to have softened, shame and stubbornness flaring across her face in equal measures. "You don't feel like it belongs to you. Yet you take full responsibility for it. While all the things you actually care about, that you're _actually_ proud of, sit tucked away—behind the scenes somewhere. In a closet, or a suitcase."

Delphine can't deny it. In this instance, she feels too much shame, too much regret. But so much resentment, too. How could Cosima have lain beside her just the night before, stroking her face—how could she have _loved_ her—thinking these thoughts? Looking at her— _down_ on her—with pity?

"It doesn't have to be that way," Cosima says, stepping forward, wearing a small, hopeful smile. "You could smile—for real."

She did smile, with Cosima. When they were on stage together. When they were in bed, blanketed in their idealism. When they were in the sun, laughing.

It dawns on her just how unfair this all is. Just how pompous.

"Don't look at me like that—with that sympathy." She steps back, shaking her head, rubbing at the pinpricks in her eyes. "I love you, you know?" She feels foolish for saying it—doesn't know what compels her. But it's the truth. Cosima's eyes widen. "It's true," she laughs again. "I never looked at you and thought you were different. All those times you called me 'rock star,' that you would tease me—I couldn't stand it. Because I've _never_ looked at you and thought you were lesser. You were always just… Cosima. Brilliant, and talented, and wonderful."

Delphine rubs her eyes again, shaking her head. She can't look at the other woman right now. "But you're _so_ arrogant. Truly. You might ride around in that shitty van, and play those dives… record albums in a damn storage unit. But _you're_ the rock star. _You're_ the one with the ego." She glances down at the floor, watching Cosima shrink in her periphery, the guitarist's brow furrowed in embarrassment, in _remorse._ Quietly, Delphine shakes her head and says, "I'm not better than you. But you're not better than me either. I mean—maybe I did sell out. That's what you're trying to say, isn't it? But…"

She stammers for a moment, thinking back to the beginning of the tour, when Cosima had sat in her bunk with her, consoling her. The brunette had been so sarcastic then, so charming. So afraid of losing sight. _"I don't think you have to worry about 'selling out,' Cosima."_ That's what she'd told her then, feeling so certain. Now, she's not.

Now, she feels like a liar. Like a cliché.

"We all do it—at some point." Her face hardens again, and she stands up straighter, lifting her chin. Cosima still stares at her feet, however. "You'll see. There will be other contracts. There will be magazines, and merchandising. There will be cheesy commercials that will pay you tons of money to use your songs. And one of these days—maybe not soon—but sometime—you will be so tired. And you will say _yes._ "

Smiling faintly, her chest constricting, Delphine walks towards the door. Just inside of the threshold, she stops. "When that happens," she begins, Cosima finally meeting her gaze. The woman's eyes sparkle with unshed tears. With guilt. "I really hope you don't beat yourself up over it."

* * *

_It starts small._

_A few weeks after the contract has been signed, the ink long dried, organized neatly in a filing cabinet somewhere, she sees her face in a magazine. It's a small column—quarter of the page. In the top left corner, a photograph from a sold out show at West Hollywood's Troubador. They capture her mid-beat, one stick on the hi-hat, the other crashing down on the snare, her sweaty head thrown back while Paul, the photo's true focal point, croons into the mic._

_A month later, there's a slew of interviews that crop up on their meticulously monitored YouTube channel, managed by the finest PR reps at DYAD Records. One interview leads into a festival performance where they warm up the crowd for the year's headliner. The subsequent_ Rolling Stone _article claims that In Vitro stole the show. Their photo takes up nearly half the page. This time, Delphine isn't drumming._

_As they prepare for the release of the debut, Leekie tosses them into an exhausting media blitz. There are more magazine articles, newspaper articles, radio interviews, and finally, a short television spot in which the band are granted their own makeup artists and stylists. Delphine doesn't agree with the garish shade they paint her lips, or the color of her top. In her apartment that night, she changes the channel less than three minutes in._

_Finally, on a sunny Wednesday three weeks later, she's walking down Hollywood Boulevard, on her way to meet a friend. She stops in her tracks when it catches her eye, a couple blocks away. Looming over the street, haughty and cool, is Aldous' lucky billboard, now brandishing her face, the face of her bandmates._

_Delphine pushes her sunglasses up the bridge of her nose, keeps walking. She's already late for lunch. However, she can feel eyes on her as she strides along, gaze fixed on the sidewalk._

_She's standing just underneath it when a group of young buskers, peddling their own CDs, shout at her from behind._

" _Hey—it's you," they laugh, calling after her. "In Vitro chick! Hey—wait up!" One of the buskers jogs up to her, thrusting a CD into her hand. "Can you take that? Give it a listen? Maybe give it to—"_

" _Yes. Sure," she tells him, plucking the CD from his hand. As she's entering the restaurant later, she'll toss it into a nearby trashcan. For now, she smiles, nodding politely. "I'll see what I can do."_

_It's funny, she thinks. It starts small. And the bigger it gets, the less significant she feels._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for sticking with me this far, folks. I appreciate it so much. Still a few chapters left... I hope you'll enjoy : )


	20. Twenty

" _Well, I read your book."_ It had been a temperate day in April, warm with the touch of an impending summer, yet still refreshingly placid in the afterimage of winter. Cosima wore shorts and a tee shirt as she strolled into the rented garage Pap had transformed into his workshop. The air was thick with the grime of his work, and she coughed lightly into her fist, clearing her throat.

Pap glanced over his shoulder, one eyebrow cocked behind his thick, plastic goggles. _"What's this now?"_ A breeze had blown in through the open window then, upending the sawdust that covered the floor. For an instant, Cosima could see Conrad, his face backlit in the afternoon sunshine, motes of dust suspended around his worn face, as the man he'd been in his youth—a bit haughty, yet unendingly soft and curious.

" _Your book,"_ she told him, sweeping her hand across the end of his work table before hoisting herself up on it. _"The poems."_

" _Oh! Yeah—_ that _nonsense."_

" _Hey,"_ she laughed, grinning toothily as he waved a dismissive hand, _"you're the one who insisted I have it."_

" _It was taking up shelf space."_ Eyes narrowing in concentration, he hunched over his project once again. In the final years of his life, he'd taken to carving intricate, wooden houses—facades, their insides hollowed—with near obsessive industriousness. By the time of his death, his apartment would be littered with a veritable city of miniature houses.

After a moment's pause, holding the tiny house up to the light for inspection, Conrad had glanced sidelong at her and said, _"I'm surprised you actually read it."_

Ten years later, the book wobbles slightly in her hand, shaking as the van barrels up I-95 at 80mph. Pushing her glasses up to wipe the bleariness from her tired eyes, Cosima readjusts the flashlight on her phone, turning to the next dog-ear. The headlights of passing cars cast distorted shadows over the page. Drawing the tip of her finger across the ink, she mouths the verse with eyes half-lidded.

"Inside of you is an earnest, seeping brightness/same as the light that streamed through childhood blinds/to wake me from slumber on a Sunday morning."

" _I'm guessing you have some thoughts on it."_ Conrad had chuckled, pushing his goggles onto his forehead. Turning, he set down his house—a replica of Aunt Gert's cabin, which he'd made and remade seven times since her death half a year before, claiming with each attempt that he'd carved some inexcusable flaw. Leaning back against the table, he crossed his arms over his chest.

" _Yeah,"_ Cosima told him, a light blush crawling across her cheeks. She admitted, _"It got me thinking—about a lot of stuff."_

" _That so?"_

" _I have a question."_

" _A question."_ Nodding slowly, he'd removed his gloves, throwing them unceremoniously on the tabletop. _"Scoot, kiddo."_ Pap hoisted himself onto the table beside her, grunting slightly with the effort. _"Jesus,"_ he chuckled. _"I'm no spring chicken."_

Cosima had chuckled, too. _"I don't know what you're talking about, young man."_

" _Charming."_ Nudging her shoulder with his own, he'd grinned. Cosima would never be able to shake the image of that smile—the crookedness of it, the prominent chip in his right front tooth—it was mischief incarnate. And in that moment, it had made her grow shy. _"Cat got your tongue all of a sudden?"_ She shrugged, smiling faintly. _"What's this question of yours, huh?"_

" _Well—"_ Cosima began, her face scrunching in concentration, even slight embarrassment. She was thinking of the girl she'd been partnered with in her English class—Maggie. On Friday when she'd gone to the girl's house after school, Maggie had shut the door to her bedroom and touched Cosima's hand three times. Later, she'd asked Cosima if she'd had her first kiss yet. _"Is all poetry about love?"_

Conrad chuckled. _"How the hell should I know?"_

" _You wrote a book, Pap."_

" _Right—guess I did."_ He laughed, shaking his head. _"I don't know. That's a loaded question, kid. I guess—"_ He'd scratched his chin in thought. _"—when it comes down to it, most of it is, yeah. If not about loving_ someone else _, then just loving yourself. Or your dog. Or… the ocean—or some bullshit like that."_ Cosima laughed.

" _And what about the poems in your book? Were they about Gram?"_ Conrad raised his eyebrows, a guilty look on his face. Smiling impishly, he shook his head.

" _No,"_ Cosima asked, laughing. It was hard for her to imagine her pap ever writing poems about anybody else.

" _Sorry to say, kiddo. Your gram—light of my life, that woman—bane of my existence, too—"_ He chuckled fondly, hints of sadness in his eyes. _"She wasn't the only woman I ever loved."_

The van fills with static for a moment, startling Cosima. Frustrated, Sarah, who's volunteered to take their drive north tonight, hits the radio with the heel of her palm.

"Piece of shite," she growls, the station cutting in and out. After another few hits, the static dissipates, music returning. "Can't afford a new goddamn radio," she mutters under her breath, refocusing on the road.

Taking a deep breath, Cosima shakes her head, finger moving over the page once again.

"The sunshine unravels in your marrow/where inside of you, the light is a thread/lacing the tips of your fingers to mine."

" _Are you surprised by that?"_

" _Not really,"_ she shrugged. On Friday, in Maggie's bedroom, with her heart fluttering, her bravado had failed her, giving way to honesty. No, she hadn't had her first kiss yet. Yes, she did wonder what it would feel like. Maybe she _would_ like to practice.

" _Is that all you wanted to ask me?"_

" _Not entirely. I was just… surprised, I guess."_ She looked up at Pap then, smirking, her tongue poking between her teeth. _"You're not usually that sappy."_

" _For crying out loud,"_ he groused, shoving her playfully. _"I'm not, am I? Not now, at least. But you gotta cut me a break. I was a kid then. Like you."_ He pointed a finger into her arm with mock accusation. _"I fell in love at the same rate that I'd go through a carton of milk."_ He shrugged, smiling pensively. _"It's hard not to when you're that young. You'll understand someday."_

Cosima grew quiet then. Maggie's mouth had been warm, tasting of the candy they'd been eating just minutes before. Her tongue had been clumsy, too, and when Cosima wiped the saliva from around her mouth after, she'd felt dizzy and feather-light.

" _Or maybe you already do."_

Cosima's head had snapped up with such speed that Pap began to laugh. She wanted to contest, but knew he'd already seen through her. Her cheeks flamed in embarrassment.

" _Who is he?"_ Her stomach tightened and she looked nervously out the window. _"Okay, okay—"_ He threw his arm around her shoulder comfortingly. _"You don't gotta tell me nothin', all right?"_ She nodded. After several quite moments, Conrad sighed. _"I guess you've already got a hunch then—what could possibly make a bastard such as myself so sappy."_ Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Cosima smiling. His own grin broadening, he leaned down conspiratorially and whispered, _"Romance is stupid."_

Cosima had laughed then, fully. _"It is—so stupid. But it's pretty, too."_

" _Eh. That's open to debate,"_ Pap grinned.

" _C'mon."_ She turned to look up at him. _"What about Gram?"_

His smile softening, he looked at the miniature houses shelved in his workshop. _"She was different."_

Cosima rolled her eyes. _"People always say that, you know. I want to know why. Where are the poems you wrote about_ her? _"_

" _There aren't any."_

" _Really?"_ He nodded. _"I don't believe you."_

Pap shrugged. _"I've got nothing to hide, kiddo."_ Pausing, he tilted his head slightly, scrunching his brow. _"You wanna know the difference? Honestly?"_

" _Yeah."_

" _There's just no words, when you find the right person. What you have—it's not_ like _anything—it's not about some concept or dream. That's what's special about it. If anybody else could put it into words—if_ you _could put it into words—_ really _—it wouldn't be worth anything."_ Pap had stopped short then, hopping off the table with a slight groan.

Conrad shuffled across the floor, telling her, _"It's quiet."_ He plucked one his houses carefully from the shelf on the opposite wall. _"It's secure."_ Examining the house with gentle hands, he smiled. _"It's never born, and it never dies."_ Finally, he turned away from his granddaughter, placing the house reverently back on the shelf. With his back to her, he said, matter-of-factly, _"But it waits."_

The van rocks when Sarah drives through a small pothole, but Cosima is not deterred from her reading.

"Inside of you, there is a shine."

The funny thing about that day in Pap's workshop is, he hadn't really been talking to her. Not in the end. He'd spent the last fifteen years guiding her, delighting in every instance in which he could dole out a profound piece of advice—often with a sense of theatricality that belied his so-called aversion to poeticism. But in that one instance— _"it waits"_ —his back turned to her, he'd been speaking entirely for his own benefit.

It dawns on Cosima, suddenly, what those houses had really been. For years she had seen them lined neatly upon shelves, tabletops, and dressers. They were all made in different shapes and sizes, painted different colors. The differences, the nuances had always intrigued her. But to Pap, they'd all been the same:

A single house somewhere on a hill. The night quiet, and his heart quieter. The lamp lit. A kettle steaming. A bed turned down, the sheets crisp. And standing by the window, the woman whose love words could not describe, smiling at him and saying, _"You're home. I've been waiting."_

Her finger stills over the final line.

"And in me, a tired, quenching darkness."

"Oh my god," she says abruptly, burying her face in her hands. Her vision grows blurry with the weight of this sudden, total irony crashing down on her.

"What is it?" Disturbed by her outburst, Sarah whips around, voice low. "What's wrong?"

It's hard to put into words what's wrong—hard as it had been for her to describe the inherent comfort she'd felt with Delphine all those nights. The rooms had been unfamiliar, each one. The cities had been different, and the faces they'd passed indistinct; but in every instance, with Delphine smiling at her, she'd felt that she was exactly where she was meant to be.

But now they are apart. And now she is going home.

Home, to a place that does not belong to her, where she no longer feels an attachment to. Home, where she has no bed, where the lamp is never lit. Home, to a hollow façade on someone else's shelf—a place that does not wait for her.

"I made a mistake." It's the truth, she knows. It's all she can really say, and it means so little. Like the small, ashamed, _"I'm really sorry,"_ she'd offered Delphine that afternoon.

" _I know you are,"_ the blonde had told her, mouth tilting in some strange expression caught halfway between a smile and a frown. She had been so patient in that moment, despite her anger the night before; despite Cosima's pride and stubbornness and cowardice. She had been patient. She had been waiting.

And Cosima had walked away.

"I'm so fucking stupid," she says, head dropping to her knees. "Oh my god."

"Hey, hey—" One hand on the wheel, Sarah grips her shoulder with the other. "Hey. Calm down, Cos."

"No, _Sarah_ —Jesus Christ."

"C'mon— _shh._ " The hand on Cosima's shoulder tightens its grip. "Keep it down."

"Keep it down," she asks, incredulously, her head whipping up. There's a rustling from the back of the van. Her cheeks are already wet.

"Hey—" Felix begins, voice groggy. His head emerges from the cocoon of egg crate foam and sleeping bags in the back, a disgruntled look on his face.

"I think you should pull over."

"What," Sarah asks, her own voice rising in concern and irritation.

"What's going on?" More alert, Felix wipes at his eyes, brow pinched.

"I need air," Cosima tells them. Her heart is racing now, throat constricting with tears. It's hard to breathe.

"So open the window."

"I don't need to open a window, Sarah. I need you to _pull over_." Cosima shoves her hand away, beginning to open her door.

"Hey—" Her bandmates shout in tandem.

"For _fuck's_ sake, Cos—all right!" With a jerk, Sarah swerves onto the shoulder, her irritation flaring. "Happy," she asks, glancing at the other woman. Cosima has already pushed the door open fully though, hopping out of the van. Shaking her head, scowling and confused, Sarah turns back to glance at a bewildered Felix. "What the fuck?"

* * *

The sun is rising over the interstate in faint pink ribbons when Sarah finally, uncharacteristically, breaks the silence. "Remember that time the van broke down on the way to Pittsburgh?" They're sitting side by side, the three of them, on the embankment beside the road—Cosima hugging her knees in the morning chill, Felix leaning back on his elbows, and Sarah aimlessly tying knots into blades of grass. Snorting to herself, the drummer continues, "And then the tow-truck broke down a quarter of a mile down the road?"

"Had to call a tow-truck for our tow-truck." Felix cracks a smile, though his eyes are closed in exhaustion. "Yeah—of course. What about it?"

Sarah shrugs. "Funny shit." She pauses, plucking a dandelion from the ground and tossing it into the gravel. "The van's seen a lot." Cautiously, she scrutinizes Cosima, nudging her in the ribs. "Yeah?"

After a moment, the guitarist nods, the corner of her mouth quirking slightly. "Yeah," she agrees.

The silence stretches between them again, comfortable in the haze of their weariness. "Bad trips, late nights, major blowouts," Felix says, yawning loudly. He shakes himself back to alertness. "And—show of hands. Who here has gotten laid in there?" Immediately, he raises his own hand, Sarah scoffing.

"The fuck, Fee?"

"Oh, c'mon." He reaches behind Cosima, shoving Sarah playfully. "Don't pretend."

"We practically live in there. I don't want to think about that."

"Be honest. Raise your hand, Sarah," Felix demands, feigning austerity.

"Fine," she grumbles.

"That's right." Then, turning to Cosima, wrapping his arm around hers sweetly, he teases, " _Cos_?"

Dropping her head and smiling, she raises her own hand slowly. Her stomach twists as she recalls the night she spent with Delphine last weekend. It feels, somehow, very long ago.

"I _knew_ it!"

"Nice one, Amadeus." They both shove her, Felix burying his head in her shoulder and laughing. Cosima's smile grows, against her will. In spite of all that she's lost—of the worlds and lives she can never belong to, the homes that she will never own—she will always have this: a shitty van; a guitar; and two people who love her, steadfastly, without question.

She clenches her eyes shut, willing away the sharp pang of sadness that arrests her. It seems so unfair that, in the public eye, her persona has become so elusive and glamorous. That strangers know her name, can recognize her on the street. That her face is in magazines, her albums selling more rapidly by the week. Yet, somehow, there is still so little that she may call her own.

Felix and Sarah, defiant as they are, will always be the exception.

Sensing this, the bassist hugs her tightly about her middle, smiling gently into her shoulder. Sarah, too, with a bit more stiffness, throws her arm protectively around them both. In time, she softens—her embarrassment at this sort of affection fading into her need to shelter. Cosima feels so infinitely grateful in this moment, she can't help the heat that pricks at the backs of her eyes.

Felix and Sarah, gracious as they are, never mention the tears that fall silently down her cheeks. Instead, they allow her to wipe her own eyes, to stutter and collect her breath quietly as the cars whizz by, their passengers eyeing them nosily.

After nearly ten minutes, her arm still firm around her friends—her siblings—Sarah pushes them softly and says, "It's about time for breakfast, yeah? You hungry?"

Speaking up in her stead, Felix's head perks up, his eyes wide. "Starving."

"I guess we're in agreement." Giving her shoulder one final squeeze, Sarah stands, brushing the grass and dirt from her pants. With barely a hint of a smile, eyes decisive, the drummer stands in front of her. "We're about twenty minutes out of Raleigh. What do you say we stop in, grab breakfast, then find a hotel? I'm bloody exhausted." She offers her hand. When Cosima takes it, grasping it tightly in her own, it's all the confirmation Sarah needs. "It'll be nice—we can sleep half the day, drink the other half away. Been a while since we've been able to do that without a show in between."

"Too long," Felix agrees, rising beside them. With both sets eyes on her, Cosima nods.

"All right then." Sarah strides towards the van, her gait heavy with sleepiness. Without a backwards glance, she waves them forward. "C'mon. I'll finish up behind the wheel."

Taking a deep breath, Cosima watches her bandmates climb inside. The sun has risen high enough to cast a sharp glare into her line of vision. She shields her eyes with one hand, the other wrapping tightly around her middle.

From the open door of the van, Felix waves her forth. "Get in," he commands, exasperated, yet grinning. Peering at her from the driver's seat, Sarah honks the horn.

With a shake of her head, Cosima hops into the open passenger door, pulling it shut behind her.

* * *

By the time they check into their hotel room, having scarfed down a quick diner breakfast, it's nearly 8:30. In their exhaustion, they don't bother lugging the suitcases out of the van, knowing they'll be checking out in the next 24 hours. Instead, they each bring a backpack with a single change of clothes and a toothbrush, drawing the curtains the moment they enter the room, and collapse onto their beds.

When Cosima wakes twelve hours later, Sarah is still snoring in the bed across from hers. Felix, however, has risen from where he'd lain beside her, and stands in front of the TV with a bag of chips. She wonders if it was the crinkling that woke her.

Searching the bedside table for her glasses, Cosima rubs her eyes. She still feels as if she could roll over and fall back asleep—for another twelve hours, perhaps. Instead she yawns, stretching her limbs.

Chuckling quietly at something on the television, Felix turns to her, popping a chip into his mouth. "Good evening, Sleeping Beauty. Are you ready for the ball now?"

"I think you've got your fairytales mixed up," she tells him, voice raspy from slumber.

He shrugs, sitting down on the edge of the bed. "In any case—I'm hungry." To emphasize this point, he bites loudly into another chip. "I want to go out," he sulks.

"What," Cosima asks, attempting to stretch out the crick in her back. "Vending machine isn't going to cut it?"

"Absolutely not." After another moment, Felix swats her leg impatiently. "C'mon. I've been waiting on you two for three hours now."

"All right," she says tiredly, handing him a pillow. "Here." Grabbing one for herself, she whips it at Sarah's sleeping form, Felix immediately following suit.

"Sarah!" They shout together, the drummer startling herself from slumber and kicking the sheets.

" _Bloody hell_. What was that for?" She blinks at them, scowling. Rising from the bed, Cosima heads into the bathroom, smacking her ass on the way.

"It's time to wake up, Sunshine. We're hungry."

Putting up only a small fight, Sarah eventually cedes to the growling of her own stomach. Forty minutes later—shortly after nine—they're all moderately put together, and heading towards the parking lot. In the interest of saving a few bucks, and a few minutes, they opt to take the van downtown.

They're lucky that, despite the tight parking, they actually manage to find a spot just a block away from the pub they've chosen for the night. It's a side-street, which Cosima thinks is even better—she hates having to park their monstrosity on a main road, even for shows.

Once she gets some substantially greasy food and a couple of beers in her stomach, the guitarist finally begins feeling like herself again. She's alert, smiling, engaging in Felix and Sarah's quick repartee. Still, there's a part of her that feels ceaselessly exhausted; overwhelmed by the heat of the room, by the number of bodies, and the din of their voices.

When her phone begins buzzing on the tabletop, signaling a call from Tony, she uses it as a convenient excuse to head outside for a bit of fresh air.

"Just wanted to check your ETA, Cuz. I'm dying to have you guys to myself for a few days."

Cosima begins walking. "Oh yeah? And what've you got planned?"

Tony chuckles. "That's for me to know and you to find out."

"Well," she sighs, "try to keep the surprises to a minimum." She doesn't mean to sound so sullen—doesn't want Tony picking up on it. Clearing her throat, she hurries on. "We're still in Raleigh though. Just got too tired. We'll be hitting the road again first thing tomorrow morning."

"So…"

"Barring traffic, a quick stop for lunch—maybe four or five o'clock?"

"Just in time for dinner!" Cosima cracks a smile at her cousin's excitement, just as she passes the side-street they'd parked on. She keeps walking. Taking a stroll through an unfamiliar city at night doesn't seem particularly safe, but she doesn't particularly care either.

She and Tony talk for nearly ten minutes. When she hangs up, she's standing on the corner several blocks down from the pub, waiting for the pedestrian light to change. Sighing, she glances around, stuffing her phone in her pocket. Several faces pass by, none of them paying her any mind. The feeling of anonymity suits her, she thinks. However, as one young man brushes past her, bumping carelessly into her arm, she feels suddenly nervous.

"Hey," she calls after him. Absorbed in whatever joke his friend had been telling him, he doesn't spare her a backwards glance.

Anonymity is comfortable, yes. But invisibility is cloying.

Shaking her head, Cosima turns on her heel, stalking back in the direction she'd come from. She can feel her phone buzzing in her pocket—more than likely a text from Sarah or Felix telling her to get her ass back inside. She quickens her pace.

By the time the pub is in sight again, just a block away, she's walking so hurriedly that she almost misses the shadow moving down the side-street where they'd parked. Backpedalling a few steps, she stops, squinting into the darkness.

The shadow stops, too. "Fee," she calls, her voice echoing in the narrow space between the buildings. "Sarah?"

Nothing, still. She's seeing things probably. Nevertheless, with the beer in her belly, the agitation that had stricken her just minutes before, she uncaringly steps out of the light of the main street.

The closer she gets, the more obvious it becomes that the back doors of the van are opened.

"Sarah," she calls again. "Hey—" Cosima rushes forward, stopping short when she sees the lanky figure hunched over her gear, its arms around one of her crates. "What the fuck?"

It's a man, she thinks—though the bottom half of his face is covered by a bandana, a hood pulled over his head—there's something masculine in the shape of his brow and blue eyes, which stare widely at her. A deer caught in the headlights.

"What are you doing?" She should step away, run back to the pub. In the back of her mind she knows this. But at the same time, this stranger has her equipment—her _livelihood—_ in his arms, and she can't possibly think of letting him out of her sight. "What _the_ _fuck_ are you doing?"

He merely gapes at her for a moment. But then Cosima is reaching into her pocket, retrieving her phone, and the man springs into action.

Dropping the case, he shouts, "Jimmy!" He's staring at some point behind her, she realizes.

Paralyzed by sudden fear, she holds her hands in front of her. "H-hey. Wait a second."

The man stops then, shaking his head slightly with a quirked brow. It's an expression she knows well. _What were you thinking?_

It's the last thing she sees before the blow lands to the back of her head, her world going instantly dark.

* * *

She has no sense of how much time has passed when the voices finally start to flood back in. They're hazy, far-away sounds. For a moment, she feels like she's underwater.

But then the pain hits her, all at once—a massive throb in the back of her head that radiates down her neck. She sucks in a sharp breath through her nose, wincing.

With a blink, she opens her eyes, vision swimming. The voices are closer now.

"Cos… Cosima."

Sarah is there, cradling her face in her hands; Felix at her side, tentatively brushing his fingers over the back of her head.

"Fuck," he says, the panic clear in his voice. "She's bleeding, Sarah."

"Call an ambulance," the drummer snaps, not taking her eyes off of Cosima. "Cos—hey. You can hear me, yeah?"

Cosima nods weakly, wincing again at the stab of pain it elicits. She can't stop her head from lolling forward, groaning as it does so. She's propped against a wall, she realizes. Sitting up, though she's beginning to slump.

"All right. Okay." Felix gets up, phone to his ear. She's having trouble focusing on what he's saying. Sarah snaps her fingers in Cosima's face, startling here. "Look here. Just look at me."

"What happened?"

"You tell me," Sarah laughs, nervous. Cosima lolls forward again, the drummer catching her. "Shit—I've got you. You're okay."

"Sarah, what—" Her eyelids feel so heavy, all of a sudden.

"Don't go to sleep, Cos."

"Sarah—" With what strength she has left, she manages to lift her head. Just a few yards away, she can see the van, its back doors still flung wide open. It takes a moment, but she's able to register how empty it is.

Completely.

This time, she's laughing as she loses consciousness.


	21. Twenty One

When the police come to speak with her at the hospital the following morning, Cosima is barely coherent enough to give them a useable account. Her concussion is fresh, the stitches in the back of her head throbbing in such a way that she imagines her skull cracking open like an egg. The thought turns her attention to the tray of cafeteria food sitting abandoned beside her bed, her stomach turning at the sight of it.

"I don't know," she grimaces, voice shaky. She sticks her index finger into her ear in a vain attempt at clearing the ringing that refuses to leave. "He might've been, like… five-ten, or something? Around there."

"We're only looking for approximate numbers, Ms. Niehaus. Whatever you can give us," the officer says, taking notes at a rapid pace. Watching her hand dart across the page, Cosima's head spins slightly. She fights the urge to close her eyes. In a few hours, she ought to be released. Then she can sleep—then she can pretend none of this ever happened. "Can you tell me anything else about his appearance—anything that might stand out?"

Cosima shakes her head, the slight movement making her frown. "No. He had his hood up—I told you—bandana covering his face." She pauses. Trying to remember the assault feels like trying to watch reruns on an old television set—the antennas out of place, the transmission buzzing with static. "He had blue eyes," she tells the officer. It's the only thing she's sure of.

"Any tattoos, piercings?"

She sighs. "I _couldn't_ _see_." Sarah notices her exasperation from across the room, standing quickly to interject.

"Hey," she starts, clearing her throat. Her voice is quieter. She's never been comfortable around cops—not with the rap sheet she accrued during her youth. "Look—she's told you all she can." The drummer glances at her, frowning apologetically. "At least for now. She might remember more after a bit of rest."

With some hesitation, the officer closes her notepad, nodding. "I have to be honest with you, Miss. This really isn't much to go on—no plate numbers, very little in the way of a physical description."

"I understand," Cosima says tiredly, already slipping from the conversation.

"Using your equipment descriptions, we can call around to local pawn shops though. If anything turns up, we'll let you know immediately." The officer smiles then.

"Thanks," Cosima says.

"Of course." Turning to Felix and Sarah, she quietly asks, "Might I be able to speak with one of you privately? You could show me the vehicle."

Felix springs forward from his seat then. "Yes. Definitely."

"Excellent. You can lead the way then Mr. …"

"Dawkins," he supplies, forcing amiability.

"Mr. Dawkins." She makes another note before turning back to Cosima. "Thank you for your time, Ms. Niehaus. I know this must be very stressful for you. I can assure you though, we'll do everything we can to see that your valuables are returned."

"Thanks," Cosima repeats, biting down on a yawn.

"Take care now." With a nod to both Cosima and Sarah, she exits, Felix in tow. He turns back to smile at his injured friend one final time before disappearing, his affable voice fading as they head towards the elevator.

Sarah visibly relaxes once they've left, dragging her chair beside Cosima's bed. Plopping down unceremoniously, she kicks her feet onto the mattress, her boots abandoned against the wall. They both allow their eyes to drift shut, the guitarist's brow knitting faintly from the thumping in her head.

Silence falls between them for several moments before Cosima quietly states, "We're not getting any of it back."

Sarah's eyes open slowly, brow furrowing. "You don't know that," she says.

Cosima chuckles mordantly. "I don't know jack-shit." She rubs her eyes with the heels of her palms. "But I've got a feeling."

"C'mon…"

" _C'mon_ what?" The guitarist's voice is bitter. "Remember my friend Scotty, back in San Fran?"

"Yeah," Sarah mutters, begrudgingly.

"And you remember what happened when his band's shit got jacked while they were in LA?" The drummer remains silent. "Yeah— _nothing_ happened. The assholes were never caught. They never got any of their equipment back." Cosima throws her hands down frustratedly on the bed. "Fuck."

Sarah hesitates. After a moment she asks, "They start from scratch then?"

"No." Cosima laughs. "Well, they tried. For a little bit. Scotty took it as a sign though. He quit, went back to school." The drummer nods solemnly. Eventually she leans onto the bed, resting her chin on her folded arms.

"I'm not a quitter," she says. "Neither is Felix. Neither are you." She pauses, waiting for Cosima to respond. With a clenched jaw, the guitarist stares towards the open door. "Right?"

"No. I'm not," she replies, quietly.

"Yeah." Another pause. "This isn't just some hobby for us, Cos. Even for Fee and I. We may not be writing the songs, but we've still got a future in this. All of us. We're in it together." She's quiet for so long then that Sarah stops expecting a response. After a few minutes though, the drummer can hear her sniffling. "Cos…" Sarah reaches for her arm, squeezing warmly. It's the best she can do. "Don't get yourself worked up."

Cosima shakes her head. "I already am."

Sighing, Sarah hesitates. After a moment, she stands, shoving Cosima gently. "Move over." Without question, the guitarist complies. Sarah sits beside her, back propped against the pillows. She takes Cosima's hand in her own, twining their fingers while staring ahead at the wall. "Comfortable," she mutters, raising a brow.

"Uh huh." Cosima rubs her nose with her free hand, hiccupping through the sob she's too stubborn to allow. After several moments, Cosima squeezes her hand and quietly says, "That was everything we are. Our instruments. Our _band._ " Her eyes close, bottom lip quivering. "Even my laptop—all the demos I'd had saved on there."

"You don't have them backed up?"

"Maybe half." She shakes her head again, rubbing her temple. "I should've been more cautious. I just…" She stabs her finger into her ear once more, eyes closing. "Jesus Christ," she growls, "this ringing."

"Well," Sarah sighs again. "Let's just be honest. We've lost our instruments, our equipment—there goes our gigs for the next six months or so." She gulps, side-eyeing Cosima. There's a more delicate way to approach this, she supposes. But as stubborn as the guitarist can be, it's often more effective just to be blunt. "Your demos—"

"Meaning most of what I was planning for the next record."

"Okay." Sarah nods slowly, tightening her grip on Cosima's hand. "Our immediate future, music-wise—we've lost that."

"Fuckers couldn't even leave our suitcases."

Sarah's head falls back onto the pillow. "Shit," she says, clenching her eyes shut. "Okay, yeah—it's bad, Cos. It's pretty fucking bad."

Cosima turns to her then, slowly. Her makeup is smudged, face pale. Her glassy eyes gleam under the sterile hospital fluorescents. And though her lip still quivers slightly, the corner of her mouth quirks, a low snort escaping her.

"What?"

"Are you _just_ _now_ arriving at that conclusion?" In spite of herself, the guitarist yawns again.

Sarah balks indignantly. "Look—" She huffs, Cosima's crooked grin splitting open just a bit more. "Optimism isn't exactly my strong suit. But you're the one who got bashed over the bloody head, so—" Cosima actually laughs then, genuinely, wincing as she does so. "That's not funny."

" _Bashed over the bloody head,_ " Cosima mocks, putting on a deplorable accent. "Positivity is exhausting, isn't it? If I'd known all it would take to justify my misery was a tire-iron to the back of the skull, I would've started hanging out in back alleys a bit sooner."

The drummer gapes at her incredulously. "That shit's not funny."

"Sarah," she attempts to uncross the woman's arms from her chest. "Chill."

Sarah raises an eyebrow. "Me? _Chill?_ " Cosima nods, smile softening. "I was chill. And I was _trying_ to console you. You're the one who got all… doom-and-gloom on me."

"Dude." Cosima sighs, grasping Sarah's hand in her own once again. "I'm sorry. Okay? But this shit _is_ awful." She stares down into her lap, toying with the hem of the bedsheet. Gulping, she quietly continues, "I mean—on one hand, I know how much we lost. On the other… my head hurts too fucking much to even begin to process the scope of this." Meeting Sarah's strained gaze, she smiles sadly and says, "We're fucked. And we're poor. And if I hadn't been so—" Delphine's voice echoes in her head, causing her throat to constrict. She clears it, voice raspy. "— _self-righteous,_ we wouldn't be here right now."

"Hey—this shit is _not_ your fault," Sarah tells her, adamantly.

"No. You're right—I didn't create this problem. But can you imagine?" Her brow furrows, and she laughs again. "If I had taken the deal with DYAD—I'd already have the solution."

Comprehension dawns across Sarah's features, her eyes widening. "You're not thinking of… calling them back or something, are you?"

Cosima rubs her stiff neck. "I can't do that, Sarah. It's just… it wouldn't even be a matter of pride. It would just be way too shitty."

Sarah nods. After a moment, she asks, "So, what _do_ we do?"

"You said it yourself." Cosima sniffles, wiping her nose petulantly with the back of her hand. "We start from scratch." Sarah nods, determinedly. "We're not quitters."

The drummer smiles, a bit cockily. After a moment, her eyes widen slightly, hopefully. "We could always get help, you know."

"From who?"

"Fans? We could open a kickstarter—"

"Sarah," she interjects. "We're not beggars either."

"It's not begging. It's just… asking for assistance—"

"Semantics." Sarah sighs. "We didn't get here because of handouts. And we've never relied on other people for—"

"Okay, okay." Sarah throws up her hands in defeat. "I'll drop it." Stretching slightly, she settles back into the bed, getting comfortable. "I just think you should consider it," she mumbles.

"Yeah," the guitarist yawns, allowing her eyes to close again. She settles into Sarah's side, resting her head on her shoulder. "I'll think about it."

They're both half asleep ten minutes later when Felix walks in, plastic shopping bag in hand, knocking on the doorframe to announce his entrance. "Sorry," he mutters, eyeing them with sympathy as they startle back into consciousness, Cosima much slower than Sarah. With gentle steps, he sits down on the edge of the bed, patting the guitarist's thigh. "Didn't mean to wake you, darling," he says, voice quiet. "I just wanted to talk to you two about a couple of things before you're released."

"Any word on that," Cosima asks groggily, rubbing her eyes.

"I passed your doctor on the way up. Sounds like you're still on target for this afternoon."

"Good," she nods. Sarah sits up beside her.

"What did Officer Friendly have to say?"

"Not much. Just wanted a secondhand account. She got a look at the damage to the van, too. Minimal, all things considered. All they really did was jimmy the back door. Should hold with a bit of duct tape until we make it to your cousin's."

Cosima perks up suddenly, a look of momentary panic on her face. "Shit. Did either of you talk to Tony? Does he know—"

"Easy, love." Felix squeezes her leg, smiling. "We took care of anything. I called Tony as soon as you were admitted."

"Shit," she says again, covering her face with her hands. "If he called my parents, or even just his mom—"

"Cos—" Sarah nudges her shoulder. "They were gonna find out anyway."

Felix sighs, glancing down at his boots. "I expect it'll be on the internet sooner rather than later." He passes Sarah a furtive glance then. Side-eyeing Cosima, she shakes her head. Turning back to his injured friend, he says, "But that's not for you to worry about right now. According to Officer Murray, there's no reason why we _have_ to stay in Raleigh right now. She knows we were just passing through." Cosima nods slowly, removing her hands from her face.

She takes a deep breath. "Okay."

"We've given them all the information we can. All we can do now is wait for a phone call. But we don't need to stay here to do that."

"So… we should just leave?" There's sadness, anxiety in Cosima's eyes as she asks. Felix frowns.

"Our being here isn't going to help them find our gear," Sarah tells her softly. "You know that. We have plans. There's no point in delaying them just to stay here and sit around the hotel for days."

"We can't really afford that anyway," Cosima says after a long moment, her voice wry. Sarah chuckles.

"If we leave right after you're released, we can make it to Tony's just in time for bed," Felix says. "Sarah and I will drive. You can rest in the back. I was able to recover our blankets and sleeping bags from where they were abandoned beside the van." He rolls his eyes, muttering, " _Assholes._ " Squeezing her leg again, he smiles gently. "We'll make you up a nice bed. If you're lucky, you might just pass out for most of the drive."

Returning his meek smile, she says, "That would be nice."

Felix's smile widens, his eyes brightening suddenly in remembrance. "Oh. I have gifts, too."

Watching him hoist the plastic bag onto the bed, Sarah eyes him skeptically. "What's that?"

"They left a _few_ things behind." Felix rifles through the bag, first pulling out a couple handfuls of mix CDs. "Had these in the glove compartment." Next he hands Sarah half a bottle of bourbon, her eyes lighting as she accepts it. "That one rolled under the seat." He places a couple of polaroids and a scratch-off lottery ticket on the bed. "Those were tucked into the visor. Twenty dollars on that ticket. We cash that in and we might be able to afford drive-thru dinner." With a chuckle, he pulls the last item from the bag, handing it over to Cosima with a soft smile. "And _that_ one was stuffed into the passenger side door. With a pile of trash. But I didn't think you'd care if I got rid of that."

With a tentative hand, Cosima brushes her fingers along the faded cover of Pap's book, a slow smile spreading across her face. In spite of her stubbornness, the tears form in her eyes. Flipping through the pages for reassurance, for an anchor, she laughs once, the sound swallowed in a sob.

"I figured that might make you happy." Unable to speak, she only nods, Sarah throwing an arm around her shoulder. Leaning forward, Felix squeezes her leg again, drawing her attention.

"Fee… thank you."

"You don't need to thank me. It was there the whole time." He smiles again, canting his head impishly to the side. "Not everything is lost."

For a moment, Cosima actually believes him.

* * *

She breathes a bit easier when they finally, exhaustedly, arrive at Tony's apartment shortly after nine pm. As they drive past, pulling into the paid parking lot across the street, she can see him sitting on the curb, dragging on his cigarette as if his life depends on it. When Felix honks the horn, he jumps to his feet, walking into the street without a care. His eyes go wide, arms crossing impatiently over his chest.

He doesn't wait for her to come to him. The moment she begins pulling the door open, he's there, a consternated dip in his brow.

"Hey." Tony throws his cigarette to the asphalt without any of his usual aplomb, helping her out of the van with both hands. He holds her at arm's length for a moment, one hand coming up to cradle the side of her head, eyes darting about in search of any apparent injury. Aside from the stitches, there's no obvious signs of damage—merely exhaustion. "You okay?" He asks gently.

"I'm here," Cosima chuckles half-heartedly.

"Fucking right you are." He purses his lips, and for a moment, she actually thinks he might reprimand her. His mouth opens and closes. Instead, he huffs. "C'mere," he says, pulling her into a tight embrace, still cradling her head.

She feels some disappointment. Part of her had hoped he would yell at her, she realizes—hopes _anyone_ will yet at her. It might ease the burden of having to silently castigate herself.

Tony's relief is palpable though. Even after he's released her, leading them into his small apartment, he does not stray far. Once he's locked the door behind them, he sits her carefully on the couch, immediately trying to busy himself with tending to his guests.

"You guys want anything? A drink? Food?"

"A bed," Felix says tiredly, plopping down into an armchair.

"Yeah, of course. Soon. You're not hungry?" He glances at Sarah then.

"We stopped at a drive-thru about an hour and a half ago," the drummer tells him, sitting down beside Cosima. She doesn't hesitate to kick her boots up onto the coffee table. "I could go for a drink though."

"Yeah, sure. A _drink_ -drink," Tony asks, heading into the kitchen.

"Yeah," she laughs. "Whatever's most likely to make me go blind."

"Well, I'm fresh out of bathtub hooch, unfortunately," He calls from the other room. Peeking his head around the corner however, a bottle of tequila in hand, he says, "This'll have to do."

"We'll make it work," Sarah says, already reaching.

"Fee?"

"Well, if it's happy hour…"

Cosima watches the conversation in a haze, still feeling more like a spectator than an actual participant in her own life. When Tony returns a moment later, three glasses and two bottles in hand, she glances up at him, dazed. He pours Sarah, Felix, and himself a finger of tequila each; Cosima he hands a bottle of water.

"Don't complain," he warns her, pointing a stern finger. She finds the gesture comical. It's not often that she gets to see Tony acting so rigid—only when his protectiveness goes into overdrive.

Wrinkling her nose as he passes Sarah her glass though, she says, "I wasn't going to. The smell alone is making my stomach turn."

"Uh, sorry," he says, downing half his tequila with a distasteful wince. "We'll drink quick. I promise."

"No—don't worry about it." She sits up quickly, stopping short when hit with a small wave of dizziness. "I think I just want to go to bed."

"Yeah? Hold on—" He sets his glass down quickly, jumping up to help her to her feet. Squeezing her shoulder he tells her, "You need a real bed. You and Sarah can have mine."

She doesn't argue. "And you?"

He pats the top of the couch, grinning toothily. "Pulls out into a queen." Then, glancing impishly at Felix, he says, "It's the company that matters, really."

"I don't know how I feel about that," Sarah scowls.

"Well," Tony places a hand emphatically over his chest. "By all means—you can come sleep with me instead. I wouldn't mind that one bit."

Sarah narrows her eyes. "Don't be a smart-ass."

"That's what I thought." Turning back to Cosima, Tony's expression softens. "C'mon, Cuz. I'll set you up."

He ends up giving her an old Phillies tee shirt and a pair of gym shorts for the night. When she finally gets in bed, he cousin brings her a bottle of aspirin. The pain still gnaws at the back of her head, but once Tony turns out the light, shutting the door to his room, sleep comes easily to her.

She wakes the next morning to Tony rummaging through his dresser drawers. Reaching for her glasses on the bedside table, she accidentally knocks over the aspirin, causing him to jump.

Rubbing the back of his neck sheepishly, he gives her an apologetic smile and says, "Didn't mean to wake you. I was just getting some clothes."

"No big deal," she says, voice raspy. Sarah isn't in bed, she notices, though the sheets are still mussed from where she had been. "What time is it?"

"Ten."

"Ten? And you're all up?"

Tony shrugs. "We didn't last too much longer after you last night." Cosima glances at the empty space beside her, skeptical. "Your bandmates are currently eating me out of house and home." He rolls his eyes.

"Huh," she snorts, tentatively rubbing the back of her head. She's pleased to find the pain has lessened considerably. Running a hand through his hair, Tony abandons his search for clean clothing, sitting down at the edge of the bed.

"Hey—I wanna talk to you about something."

Cosima sits up, one eyebrow raised. "Right now?" He glances at the door. Sarah and Felix's voices carry faintly from the kitchen.

"Seems like a good time." Turning to her with a comforting smile, he assures her, "It's nothing bad. Just an idea."

"Oh. All right."

He swings his legs onto the mattress fully, sitting Indian-style as he faces his cousin. "After you went to sleep last night, I was talking with Sarah and Felix—"

"That's never good."

He raises an eyebrow. "Quiet—I'm being serious."

"I know. It's weird."

"Then let me say my piece," he laughs, mildly exasperated. "I just had this idea, you know. Fee and Sarah told me that, even before the robbery, you weren't exactly… in a good place." He looks down at his lap then. "Because of Delphine." Cosima's stomach dips instantly. "Which—I know you're not up to giving me any details right now. I'm not asking. But… you all right?" He meets her eyes then, holding her gaze in such a way that she knows she can't lie.

Swallowing, she says, "I'm not okay with any of this, man. It's _all_ shit. First I fuck it up with Delphine, and now this?"

He nods understandingly. "You haven't been dealt the best hand."

"That's an understatement."

"Yeah—sorry. I'm not… totally sure what to say."

She laughs. "Nothing—please."

Tony nods again. "I get that. For now, at least. And while I can't really imagine what that whole thing with your girl is like, I have a pretty good idea about all the other stuff." She nods, too. _Your girl_ , he said. It could be the concussion, making it impossible to focus on two points of misfortune at once, but she latches onto those words—can only really feel that he's speaking about Delphine in this moment. Can only _think_ about Delphine in this moment.

"Listen," he continues. "I don't want to sound like a dick, but with everything that's happened this week, it just sort of seems like… you might be due for a change of scenery. Right? Don't you think?"

Her brow furrows. "What do you mean?"

"I just mean—you've lost a lot. Not everything," he's quick to shake his head. "But _a lot_ , Cos. And _right now_ —it's hard for me to imagine you just going back to the west coast and pretending none of this shit ever happened. That's not good."

"I wasn't going to pretend—"

"Okay, no," he amends. "But you're going to go right back to your old life? Same routine?"

Cosima shrugs, her heart sinking. Honestly, she hadn't been thinking that far ahead. It does seem strange to her—even a bit pathetic. Her life has changed. It would be unfair to act as though it hasn't.

Tony reaches forward to poke her in the knee. "So, here's my idea: don't go back."

She's quiet for a moment, parsing out his meaning. "Don't go home?" Even as she says it— _home_ —the word sounds false.

"Stay with me for a little while." Cosima looks up at him then. His wide eyes are earnest, demanding nothing. They don't beg, and they don't push.

"For how long?"

Tony shrugs. "A month? Three months?" She blinks, knowing she should contest. "As long as you need. It doesn't matter, Cos."

It's an unexpected offer—a big change—to uproot herself, start fresh 3,000 miles from where's she's spent most of her life. 3,000 miles from her friends.

"I couldn't," she answers, impulsively, her heart fluttering with a sense of panic and excitement.

"Why not?"

"Where—" She shakes her head, mind moving rapidly through the possibilities, through the _plausibility_ of this arrangement. "Do you even have room?"

"The pullout is comfy," he reminds her, grinning suddenly. "Fee can attest. It's a bit more spacious than his couch."

"But what about Felix and Sarah?"

His grin softens, and he pokes her again. "They'll always be waiting, Cos. You know that. But we talked about this last night. They'd miss you like hell, but they think this might be really good for you—for a while." He chuckles then. "If you decide to stay any longer than six months they might kidnap you though."

She stares at him, brow furrowed. There's a part of her—the old part—resistant to change—that's begging to deny him outright. _Go home_ , it tells her. _Forget it._ But then there's the other part, emboldened, caught up in the momentum of the last month of her life, that fears, for even a second, looking back. A part of her that knows home is not a place, but a feeling—of growth and security—something that Tony is offering to her so willingly. A part of her that cannot and will not forget.

"I don't have any money, Tony." It's her last ditch at turning him down. "I mean—I can't contribute much."

"I've thought about that." Leaning forward, he pinches her ribs, eliciting a sudden yelp. "You eat like a damn bird compared to me. I don't think it'll be a problem. Besides—" He strokes his scruffy chin in thought. "I've got some connections. I can hook you up with work if you want." She stares out the window, attempting to find a good reason to say no. _Felix_ _and Sarah_. They're the only one she can think of, and even they agree staying would be best.

"This is a huge favor, Tony. Like—colossal."

He grins that shit-eating grin again. "What can I say? I'm kind of a great guy."

"Great cousin." No, more than that. "Great brother," she quickly amends. Because Tony always has been, and will always be.

"Well, look at it this way," he beams with excitement now, likely running over months' worth of debauchery in his head. "Once we get you back up on your feet, ready to hit the road again… you might be dragging my ass along with you."

She laughs then, his enthusiasm contagious. "Dude, you just say the word. There's always room for you."

"Good. Because you weren't getting a say in the matter anyway."

For a moment, she feels like a kid again, sitting across from Tony in bed, planning their mischief. She doesn't forget about the events of the past few days; but they smile, and the sting of it all lessens.

She catches him off guard with the fierceness of her hug. "Thank you," she says. "Seriously." He doesn't truly respond—simply returns her bear-hug with one of his own. It's all she needs to know that she's welcome.

* * *

Sarah and Felix stay with them for five more days. By their last night, Cosima is feeling well enough to not only throw back two beers and a shot, but to chase them with a hamburger and a basket of fries.

It's nearing eleven pm, and they're tucked into the quietest corner of Tony's chosen tavern when Felix pulls out his phone, holding it up in front of Cosima. While her own had been nabbed in the robbery, her cousin had given her an old flip phone he'd had tucked into his bedside table. Though somewhat archaic, she'd gratefully accepted it—to allow herself some means of communication with her bandmates after their departure. Of course, with a new number and sim card, it would be impossible for her to maintain contact with most of her acquaintances and old friends, but she supposed that that, too, was part of the clean slate.

"Take a picture. It'll last longer." She smiles through a mouthful of fries, staring into Felix's phone with narrowed eyes.

"I'm not taking a picture," he tells her, Sarah peeking at the screen over his shoulder and nodding.

"He's recording."

Cosima groans. "Why?"

"One for the archives, darling," Felix mutters, hitting the record button. "It's been too long." In the early days, when they'd first started touring, Felix had insisted on keeping video journals of their progress. _"For posterity,"_ he'd always tell them. _"We may be famous someday. Best to capture our humble beginnings while they last."_ It had become something a running joke among them—the _When we're famous_ line. Mostly, the videos had served as a memento for the nights lost to partying.

"I thought we weren't doing that anymore," Cosima asks, wiping her face.

"I never said that. I just got a little lax with my record-keeping, is all."

Shaking her head, she sighs and acquiesces. "And I have to be the spokesperson?"

"You're the star, Amadeus," Sarah laughs, eliciting an emphatic eye roll. Tony laughs, too, leaning back in his chair, amused.

"What do you want to know?" Cosima stares into the camera, taking another sip of her beer.

"We've had a big month," Felix prompts her. "I'm sure _future generations_ will be eager to know about how we ended up on tour with the 'biggest rock band in the world'."

Cosima glosses over most of the details—such as Delphine's part in the matter—but she manages to give a brief and informative account of the last month with minimal sarcasm. It's only when Felix quietly encourages her to continue, to speak of what happened after, that she falters.

The robbery is still a blur to her; but with her friends egging her on, she's at least able to describe the moment in which she first realized what was to come, when she saw the thief with his arms around her equipment, half the van already unloaded. She describes the brief moment of consciousness she had in the alleyway, as well, when she saw the aftermath for the first time.

"So," Felix begins, meeting her eyes over the top of his phone. "Tell us what this really means—for the future of Nautilus."

She pauses, downing the rest of her beer, then gives him a soft smile. "We're still here. Nautilus isn't going anywhere." She passes Sarah a smile, too, the drummer nodding at her. "But, as of now, we can't carry on as we have been. We can't tour, can't record. Can't really do anything." She pauses, tilting her head and sighing. "I've kind of resigned myself to the fact that we aren't getting our stuff back. And that's… okay? It's a little hard to say that, honestly. I'm very sentimentally attached—to a lot of it. But it _is_ just stuff, you know?" She pauses again, resting her chin in her hand. "Stuff comes and goes. The band though—" She laughs, somewhat sarcastically, giving them a mock cheer. "We've still got each other, guys!"

Cosima shakes her head then, smiling determinedly, though the sadness still creeps around the edges of her face. "We're starting over."

After Felix cuts the recording, Tony claps her on the shoulder, shaking her. "Remember—what doesn't kill you, Cuz—"

"Leaves you broke as shit with a concussion and six stitches?"

Sarah laughs then, holding up her beer bottle for a toast. "Hear, hear," she exclaims, the others clinking their bottles in agreement.

Several hours later, as Sarah and Cosima lay in bed talking, Tony's room lit only by the city lamplight streaming in through the blinds, the door opens with a creak. Muttering his apologies, Felix crawls into bed with them, practically stepping on Sarah in the process. The room fills with a mixture of her expletives and Cosima's laughter, the box-spring groaning in protest beneath the combined weight of their bodies. Once settled, the guitarist sandwiched between her friends, Felix throws his arm around her, resting his head atop Cosima's.

"You just ruined a perfectly good conversation about seahorses, Fee," Sarah informs him, feigning her annoyance. "I hope you're happy."

Felix barks a quiet laugh. "Seahorses? Is that what women talk about when they're in bed together?"

"Honestly?" Cosima cranes her head up to look at him. "Sometimes."

"Oh god," he says, his laughter dying down. After a moment, the quiet descending, he throws his other arm around Cosima to pull her into a hug. "I'm going to miss you."

"I know." Cosima sobers. "I almost turned down Tony for you guys."

"Shut up," Sarah tells her quietly, poking her in the ribs. "It's not forever. Just a few months, yeah?"

"Yeah," Cosima nods quickly.

"Tony's an asshole, but he's one of the best guys I know. He'll fix you up, Cos."

"Yeah," she nods again.

"I don't know," Felix says, his voice somewhat skeptical. "Your life might be a bit of a mess." Cosima laughs before he continues. "I'm still not convinced that it needs fixing though."

 _Not all of it,_ Cosima thinks, sinking down into the mattress, her best friends flanking her on both sides. The imperfections are some of her favorite parts.


	22. Twenty Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here is the last chapter, folks! There will be an epilogue to follow shortly. I hope you enjoy!
> 
> (Also, suggested listening for this chapter: "I Went To the Store One Day" by Father John Misty.)

The basement reeks of sweat.

Mostly sober, Cosima feels drunk, the heat of the night wrapping her in its gauzy filaments. It's a little hard to breathe, but she doesn't find the claustrophobia entirely unpleasant. The lack of oxygen goes straight to her head, like a fever.

It's been a long time since she's been just one in a crowd. A faceless spectator, cradling a plastic cup of warm, tasteless beer against her chest; her tank top moist with sweat and clinging hotly to her skin. The buzzing in her ears is so loud that it verges on quiet. She cheers in toneless elation, the sound swallowed by every mouth shouting in tandem beside, behind, and above her. There's so little pressure—only friction—the sense that the room could combust at any moment. The sense that they would all welcome it, together, with naïve glee.

Tony's band dominates the stage tonight. He's always described his own music as being uncomplicated. While Cosima will argue against that— _"_ Nuanced _, Tone—that's the word you're looking for."—_ she can admittedly listen to him play without the mind-numbing level of scrutiny she might labor over with other bands.

They've played under a different name every time Cosima has seen them. Tonight, the hastily painted banner that hangs behind them reads _John Lennon's Penis—"Because all musicians to have written a sappy love song in the past fifty years have been naught but pubes in the massive bush of the late, great Beatle."_ That had been Tony's musing, at least, as he'd helped his lead singer introduce the band.

_Nuanced,_ Cosima marvels, once again. She can charm an audience with her verve and sincerity, but she never quite learned how to make them laugh. Rather, she never quite learned how to shake her nerves long enough to have a sense of humor. Tony, on the other hand, is so terrifically loosened-up that he seems constantly on the brink of sliding off the edge. And he has, on more than one occasion, only for the crowd to surf him across the room on the tremulous wave their hands had made.

The basement truly is a different beast.

She had lived for this in the early days, when she and Tony had toured with each other. She had lived for the fear and the thrill. For the cheap drinks and the rare bloody nose. She had lived for falling into bed with the sunrise, wearing the same outfit for two nights straight. She had lived for depravity.

Though she had never _truly_ been a degenerate, had never lived that low. She'd only had the illusion, she now realizes, as the flailing elbows of the boys beside her jostle her drink.

"Watch it, man." She shoves one of the boys back, to no avail. He smiles down at her, laughing, his pupils blown wide, and pushes her again, this time with intent.

It's all fun and games—all of it—until someone spills their beer. "The fuck?" She pulls her sopping shirt away from her chest, trying to save herself from the swill now dribbling onto the floor. Apparently, this travesty is uninteresting enough to have already lost the attention of its culprits. The guys holler at the stage, despite Cosima's bids for their attention, bouncing away from her a moment later, completely oblivious.

"Fucking assholes," she mutters, pushing her way aggressively through the crowd, towards the bathroom. The crowd pushes back, rebuffing her every step. It doesn't help that she's smaller than the majority of them. She keeps her head down, hands balling tightly as she manages to elbow her way out of the throng.

The line to the bathroom consists of one guy, slumped on the floor with vomit dribbling down his front; and an oblivious couple who seem very close to removing each other's clothing. Cosima's lips curl into a sneer as she side-eyes them, scoffing in disgust in spite of the uncontrollable twist of envy in her gut.

When the door opens a minute later, two disheveled girls stumbling out, giggling, she nudges the puke-covered drunk with her foot—out of courtesy. "Hey, buddy." He doesn't even flinch. Sighing, she hurries into the bathroom, passing the indecent couple one last glance before slamming the door shut.

Her hands tremble slightly with her frustration—wringing the beer from her shirt, wiping it hurriedly with wet paper towels. It's a lost cause, she knows, but her wardrobe has been so pathetically diminished that it's worth trying to save, even if this shirt is a size too big. She pulls the damp material from her chest, holding it out under the dim, flickering fluorescents. Her brow furrows.

The bassline thumps through the door, the steady pulse of it meshing with the incessant ringing in her ears. With a slight growl, she crumples the paper towels and throws them at the garbage can, where they merely roll off the already overflowing mound of trash.

She feels too hot, all of a sudden, too tired. Turning the faucet back on, she cups a hand full of cold water, and splashes it over her flushed cheeks; massages her eyes beneath her smudged frames. Her eyes are bleary when she peers into her reflection.

She barely recognizes herself in the cracked glass, where everything from hearts to expletives are scratched crudely into the surface. Everything smells of piss, and she can barely hear herself think. _How_ had she ever loved this—this exhausting, sweaty lifestyle?

She'd convinced herself she'd lived low before, just because she'd lived in vans, surfed couches, went hungry for her albums. But that had been her _choice_. She'd only ever lived on the cusp, with money in the bank, tricks up her sleeve. _A plan._ Now she's poor. No job, no opportunities to speak of. Just her cousin's charity, a wardrobe parsed together from hand-me-downs, and a borrowed guitar. The sad thing is, she doesn't even have the _motivation_ she had then—back in the beginning, when the sky was always falling and she reveled in its ruin.

And to think, just a month and a half ago she was playing for sold-out arenas.

Cosima actually laughs, balking when she remembers what she'd had then. She wishes it was the music she really missed, but knows that isn't true.

She rubs her eyes again, pulling Tony's phone from her back pocket. She'd left her own back at home, not caring to wait on the texts she wasn't going to receive. Felix and Sarah were in constant communication with her, but other than a few concerned calls from her parents and Tony's mom, nobody had been asking for her. However, she'd gladly volunteered to hold her cousin's phone while he was on stage.

She no longer hesitates to open Twitter and Instagram—no longer scrolls casually through her feed waiting for Delphine's name to show up. Instead, she enters it directly into the search bar.

She checks for updates at least five times a day. In the first week, she'd felt somewhat embarrassed by this compulsion, particularly when Tony would tease her. But after he'd realized how tenuous her emotional stability truly was—how critical this shameless ritual was in maintaining her composure—he'd dutifully turned a blind eye.

Before and during tour, Delphine hadn't been very attached to social media, Cosima noticed. Her Twitter and Instagram were only sparsely updated with vague, laconic posts. In the past month, she hasn't posted anything.

Tonight is no different. Undeterred, Cosima checks In Vitro's pages next. From their Twitter posts, it's clear that they've just finished with a slew of TV appearances and interviews in preparation for the European leg of their tour next month. While Cosima isn't necessarily a fan of their music, she's sad to think that they'll be touring again so soon, and she won't get to be there to experience it.

Her heart jumps when she opens up Instagram and sees a new photo posted—by Beth, she assumes. The band is in an airport terminal, Art and Paul conked out in their seats while Delphine, sitting several feet away, stares out the window. The caption simply reads, _"heading home."_

The buzzing in her head seems to drown out. Her hands still around the phone as she calmly studies the photo. Delphine is too far away for her to tell is she looks tired or sad, if she's wearing a shirt that Cosima once divested her of, if the book in her hand is a book of poems.

Delphine is too far away.

Cosima saves the photo to Tony's phone, texting it to herself before immediately deleting it.

* * *

She smokes cigarettes now. Rather, she steals one out of Tony's pack every night before bed. It's never been Cosima's vice before—she hates the taste, actually, but finds the smell oddly comforting. This is just another ritual, another compulsion. Leaning out of the bedroom window, the breeze gently caressing her face, the city is somehow both very quiet and very loud—very alive in a way that makes her feel kinetic.

"That's not my last one, is it?"

"No." Cosima shakes her head, glancing back at Tony. She's never startled by his sudden appearances. They're always together now.

"Light me one." His hair is still wet from the shower as he ties it into a sloppy bun. While Cosima fishes out a second cigarette, he rifles through his dresser, pulling on a fresh tank top before joining her.

They smoke in companionable silence for a couple minutes. On the street below, a group of twenty-somethings walk past, laughing raucously amongst themselves. Cosima wrinkles her nose, flicking ash.

"Did you enjoy the show tonight?"

"You're better than ever, man," Cosima tells him. She means it.

"It sucked," he says, unaffected. She looks over at him skeptically.

"Shut up."

Tony shrugs. "I know how to work the audience. But I feel like, lately, all we can draw is bratty teenagers." He takes another drag. "I fucking hate teenagers."

Cosima laughs. "You're not even twenty-six yet."

"I know." After a moment, he shakes his head. "We're gonna break up."

"It's happening? For sure?"

"Yeah, I guess." He turns to her and smiles. "I'm leaving them, in any case."

"What the hell prompted this?" He glances back out the window, brow furrowing slightly. "I thought you loved playing dives?"

"I got bored." He offers no further explanation, his lips curling into a slow, Cheshire grin.

"That's it?"

"That's it, man."

"Huh." Cosima shakes her head, smiling with him. She stubs her cigarette on the windowsill and flicks it out the window. "What's next?"

"Follow the leader." With another drag, he turns to her, blowing smoke through his nostrils. "O Captain, my Captain." She stares down into her lap, her stomach twisting suddenly with anxiety. "How's the album coming?"

She snorts incredulously. "What album?"

He stares at her disbelievingly. "Well, I've never known you to _not_ be writing an album." His brow knits again. "Particularly not when the stakes are, you know—high."

Cosima frowns. "Are they?"

"Yeah," he says, matter-of-factly. "I mean—personally. You're supposed to be, like… pulling yourself up by your bootstraps. Getting back on the horse, and all that."

"Right." She yawns. "I don't know. The stakes feel pretty low to me. Honestly." Tony stares at her, waiting for her to elaborate. When he finishes his cigarette, she tries to stand, but he tugs on her wrist gently.

"Don't."

"What?"

He raises his eyebrows. "Apathy doesn't look good on you, Cuz."

She laughs, rolling her eyes. "It's not apathy."

"Then what is it? Self-pity? Pining?" When she doesn't respond, Tony continues. "C'mon. You never played music for the enlightenment, Cos. Your songwriting has always been about neurosis. I find the fact that you're not working on anything—especially _now_ —to be a bit disturbing."

Cracking a reluctant smile, Cosima says, "I can't tell if you're joking."

"Half," he smirks. "The other half kind of feels like you're going to crack and beat me with a wire hanger for leaving the toilet seat up or something."

"Bullshit." She chuckles, shoving him.

"All right," he says, throwing his hands up. "I might be exaggerating." He sobers, wearing a gentle expression. "It's just weird, is all I'm saying. Used to be—if we left you alone in a room with an instrument for more than an hour you'd have written a new song. Now—you've got my guitar at your disposal anytime, and I hardly ever see you use it."

"I do," she says, somewhat weakly. She stares back out the window, placing her chin in her palm. "Just not often."

Tony takes a measured pause. "I'm sorry they never found any of your gear."

"Yeah. Me, too." Tapping her fingers distractedly on the windowsill, Cosima admits, "But I don't think that's it." Tony waits for her to continue, patient and curious. "I was so bummed about it, dude. For the first few weeks. I don't know how obvious it was to you, but… I felt bad. Like, the timing—it was just so fucking awful, you know? And there was some part of me—the, uh, _Conrad_ part of me—" She chuckles for a moment, Tony joining her. "—maybe—some part that thought that, like… it was 'a sign,'" she says, with tired melodrama.

"But you don't really believe that, do you," Tony asks knowingly.

She shakes her head, smiling. "It was an awful coincidence. That's all." Clearing her throat, she continues, "I'm pretty sentimental. But it's not like I'm gonna let an instrument dictate my career." She closes her eyes for a moment, expression pensive. "I _loved_ that Bobkat. It was a beautiful guitar, man. And the sound—I knew it so well. I knew exactly how to transform it."

"Yeah," Tony agrees. "It was beautiful. It didn't have the best sound though."

"No. There's better," Cosima agrees. "I'll find better." Shaking her head, she says, "That's totally _not_ the point. I've realized that. Like, I _could_ sit down with any instrument, in anyone's van or anyone's house, and it wouldn't make a difference. It never made a difference. As long as I was alone, and I could think, and I could feel it. That's all that ever mattered."

Cosima swallows thickly then, turning to him with a sad smile. "Except that it's not—anymore." Tony sighs quietly, looking down. When she continues, he can hear how choked her voice is, how difficult it is to maintain her composure. "Because I don't want to be alone. That used to make me happy. I could be alone _all_ the fucking time. I could just play music, and it was enough. Actually, it was _more_ than enough. It was everything.

"But now it's not. Because when I'm alone..." Cosima grimaces slightly then, her cheeks flaming with embarrassment, perhaps even shame. "I just think about her." She laughs, a bit sardonically. "Isn't that fucking _something_? I mean—I can't believe that's true," she balks. "It's actually true. I think about her, and I can still feel her in this weird way. And it's so stupid? Isn't it?"

She wants Tony to tell her that it is—that's it's stupid, and that she should let it go. But he doesn't

"I only knew her for a month, and I didn't even _have her_ that long."

"That doesn't matter, Cos," he says, ducking his head to catch her gaze.

She meets his eyes for a second before turning away, glancing out at the city skyline once again. "It should. But, none of the things I thought would matter right now really do."

"Sorry," he tells her, after a long moment. There's nothing more he can say really.

Cosima shrugs. There's nothing more she wants to hear, either.

* * *

She reads now, too, more than she has in years. Mostly sci-fi and fantasy—the classics. Real life bores her lately, unless there's at least a hint of magic to it.

She's about halfway through an H.G. Wells anthology—reading _The Island of Doctor Moreau_ —when Tony begins shouting to her from the kitchen, laughing incredulously. A moment later, he runs into the living room and plucks the book from her hands.

"Hey!"

Ignoring her protests, Tony jumps onto the couch, tossing the book unceremoniously to the floor. "It's happening, Cuz! It's happening!"

"What," she begins, sitting up on her elbows, "the hell are you talking about?"

"What am I…?" He laughs again, shaking his head. Finally, he thrusts his phone into her face. "This, dude!"

It takes a moment for her eyes to adjust, to scan the webpage displayed on the screen, and even then, she can't entirely register what she's seeing.

_Nautilus: just like starting over._

"It's a Kickstarter." She looks up at him, half suspicious, half quizzical. Tony has the good sense to look at least mildly sheepish; however, any shame he may feel is belied by the wide grin on his face.

"Look at it," he tells her, pointing at the phone. Brow furrowed, she does as she's told, her eyes narrowing as she scrolls down the screen.

"How…" She shakes her head. "I never— _you_ never asked me about this." Tony throws his hands up defensively, his smile not yet broken. In fact, he laughs. "Tony… Jesus Christ." She stops completely when she finally acknowledges the pledge amount. "7,654 _fucking_ dollars?"

"I know!" Cosima feels light-headed, for a moment. She sits up completely, mouth gaping open. She hadn't consented to this project. Hadn't asked for this money.

Nevertheless, it's hers. "7,654 dollars," she repeats quietly. "Out of how much?"

"7,000."

"Holy shit." She runs a hand through her dreads. "7,000? That was our goal?"

"Yeah! Yeah—look," he takes the phone back, scrolling down the page. "You can read the description if you want. Or watch the video."

"Video? How the hell did you get a video?"

Tony smirks. "It's from that last night with Felix and Sarah—in the bar?"

"The journal entry. You guys used that?" She hadn't been at her best that night. Rather, she'd been melancholy and half-drunk.

"Parts of it," Tony tells her. "Trust me, it looks great. A friend of Fee's put it together—cut it with some old tour videos. It's very professional."

It takes a moment for all of this to sink in. The project description is fairly straightforward, explaining how their van had been jacked after the In Vitro tour; how they'd lost all of their gear, in addition to Cosima's laptop and what would have been the next album. The $7,000 they were asking for would go towards rebuilding Cosima's unique collection of pedals and instruments—with the promise that a new album would follow in the near future.

"When did you do this?"

"Well… it wasn't really me, okay? Felix and Sarah came up with the idea. I just helped set the thing up." Cosima shakes her head, still in shock. "It took a while to get the video together. We only opened the project a day ago—"

"A day?" It's so hard to believe.

Tony's smile softens, something like admiration flitting through his expression. "Yeah," he sits down beside her, finally. "A day, Cuz. Maybe 36 hours."

There's silence between them for a long moment before Cosima laughs, this time with tears in her eyes. It's true, she never wanted this. But now she has it, and she can't believe how quickly the gratitude moves through her.

"How," she asks, smiling.

Tony shrugs. "Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr—the usual suspects. If you still had a smartphone, you might have figured it out sooner."

"Shit." She turns to him, grinning crookedly. "I can't believe it. How many people?"

"A couple hundred so far," he tells her. "The comments section is insane." He hands her the phone, allowing her to scroll through. It's true. The outpouring of love is unlike anything Cosima would have imagined. She can so often feel it, when she's on stage; but to actually read it is so different. It's more personal.

She wipes the wetness from her cheeks, grinning. "Wow."

"No kidding. I mean—the thing that tipped us over the edge is that one person donated, like, $3,500 this morning."

"What?" She begins scrolling through the page again until she finds the pledge. "Holy shit, dude. I can't believe someone actually gave us that much money. No one else came close."

"It's pretty incredible, isn't it?"

"Yeah, yeah…" She laughs then, looking over the reward. "And I see I owe this generous soul… a spot in the liner notes of the next album. An autographed vinyl. And a drink, on me, redeemable at any time that we may be in the same city." She raises an eyebrow, glancing at Tony. "Normally, I'd be pretty wary of that last one. But this person just handed me $3,500, so…"

Tony rubs the back of his neck, glancing away. "Yeah, well, it sounded like this anonymous patron of yours was looking to collect soon."

"Soon? What do you mean?"

"Next week?"

Cosima throws her hands up. "How is that supposed to work?"

Tony shrugs. "Look—all I know is what Sarah and Felix told me. I guess after they got the donation they sent the backer a message, thanking them. Apparently, this person has been a fan for a long time, and they were hoping to meet with you soon."

"Here? They're in Philly?"

"I don't know," Tony shrugs. "All they said is that they could be here next week. Here—" He takes the phone back, pulling up his photos. "They sent me screenshots of the conversation."

"Okay," Cosima says, looking over the messages. She raises an eyebrow skeptically in Tony's direction. "You know, usually I wouldn't go for this—"

"I know. Felix and Sarah know that, too. That's why we kept it from you until now."

She frowns for a moment before shaking her head in agreement. "All right." She blows out a heavy breath.

"Really?"

"What am I supposed to say, Tone? It's not like I'm going to argue with any of this. I don't like that you guys went behind my back but—holy shit. I think you were right on this one."

His grin widens, turning smug. "Well, what can I say—" He begins snidely, only to be cut off by a shove from Cosima. "Hey!"

"You get one free pass. Don't push it." As he chuckles, she sets the phone down on the coffee table and sinks back into the couch, taking a deep breath. "When I meet this person, you are coming with me."

"No problem—"

"Because if it turns out they want to, like, murder me—you're going down, too."

"Okay, okay," he laughs.

"Also," she says, turning to him with a cheeky smile. "I don't exactly have the money to pay for someone else's drinks right now, so, you're gonna have to cover me."

Tony stares at her humorlessly for a moment. "You're the one that's pushing it," he says dryly, standing from the couch.

"C'mon, Cuz," she laughs. "I'm still poor. What do you want me to do?"

Tony smirks mischievously as he walks from the room, telling her, "Maybe you should think about opening a Kickstarter."

* * *

Over the course of the next week, they gain hundreds more backers, and thousands more dollars. A part of Cosima truly does feel overwhelmed, and somewhat guilty. She probably never would have asked for $7,000 herself, even knowing that thousands more had been stolen from their van. She has to keep reminding herself that nobody was forced to give her money—all these people donated because they _wanted_ to help, because they _love_ her music and want more of it.

They have In Vitro to thank, in some small part. Their Kickstarter gained steam on Tumblr, and from their own posts on Twitter and Facebook. However, when In Vitro shared the link on Facebook and Twitter two days after the project opened, backers started pouring in.

She was certain then that Delphine had read their story. It was something she'd wondered ever since Tony had showed her the Kickstarter. Would the drummer see it? Would she feel pity, anger, or indifference? Would she call her?

Even if she tried, Cosima's phone had been lost, her number changed. If she was desperate, Delphine could always call Sarah or Felix. Given the way things had ended though, Cosima knows that it shouldn't be Delphine scrambling for ways to get into contact. If she wants to maintain any sort of relationship, she should be the one to reach out.

Cosima takes a deep breath. She'll have to private message Beth on Twitter just to get the drummer's number back. And while she knows that Beth has always liked her, her loyalties lie with Delphine, and the guitarist is certain she'll have to endure at least a bit of telling-off before the other woman will help her out.

It'll require a great deal of pride-swallowing, which, admittedly, has never been Cosima's strong-suit. But if that's what it takes to talk to Delphine again, then that's just what she'll have to do. It will be worth it, she knows.

Tomorrow, that is. Tonight, she and Tony are sitting inside of a small pub on Sansom Street, biding their time with a basket of French fries while waiting for their anonymous Kickstarter benefactor.

The correspondence between them, leading up to this evening, had been short and sweet. The donor had seemed enthusiastic and humble—in spite of, or perhaps because of, having just handed Cosima a huge sum of money. She—Marie, she'd said her name was—had told Cosima that she didn't live in Philadelphia, but would be here on business for most of the week. They'd agreed to meet at Fergie's Pub—a favorite of Tony's, for having been kicked out three times—after dinner.

She feels nervous. Other than thanking this person profusely, she's not entirely sure what the evening will hold. While Tony had agreed to moonlight as an impromptu bodyguard, he's been so transfixed by his phone, monitoring the Kickstarter obsessively, that she doubts he would actually be of much help if the evening were to go awry.

"You know," Tony begins, stuffing a fry lazily into his mouth, eyes still glued to the phone, "at this rate, you'll reach your stretch goal in about a week."

"Yeah?" She pulls the phone from his hand, setting it down on the table in front of her. "What was that again?"

"Well, you always did talk about renting a legit studio space, furnishing it properly. Someplace with better acoustics, more room to stretch your legs. With all this extra money, you should be able to do that no problem."

She blows out another breath, shaking her head. "Damn. This is still so hard to believe."

Tony chuckles, taking back his phone. "Better get used to it."

Cosima swats his hand. "Dude, can you just put that thing down for, like, twenty minutes?"

"What?"

"I'm kind of nervous."

He sighs. "Seriously—do you want me to order you a shot?" He begins flagging down the bartender, but she pulls his hand back down.

"Not yet. I'll just wait until she gets here."

He shrugs. "Suit yourself." He checks the time on his phone. "I guess she should be here any minute now. You did say 6:30, right?"

"Yeah." She glances down at her hands, spinning the rings on her fingers.

"And we shouldn't be here more than two hours, right?"

"I guess."

"Cool. My friend Sammy is having a little party tonight. I thought we'd head over after we leave here, if you're down?"

"Sure." She glances up then, as Tony continues talking. It takes a few seconds for her brain to catch up with her eyes, but when they do, her heart nearly stops. She grabs his arm suddenly, squeezing it with such force that he nearly yelps.

"Ow—"

"Tony." Her eyes are wide as they latch onto the woman standing in the doorway, glancing around a bit unsurely, though she stands tall nonetheless. _"Holy shit."_ She mutters under her breath.

" _What?"_ Finally, he turns on his barstool, following her line of vision. When he sees her, he stops, too, laughing in disbelief. "Holy shit!"

Swallowing, Cosima hurriedly asks him, "What do you think are the odds of Delphine Cormier walking into this bar _coincidentally_?"

"Like, _super_ low."

Finally, Delphine spots them. Or, rather, she spots Cosima. It's clear, the second their eyes meet, that Tony may as well be invisible. They all may as well be—the employees, the customers—everybody but the two of them.

Cosima can't breathe. Delphine just smiles, striding over to them with a confident gait. All sound seems to drown out for a moment, until the blonde stands beside Tony, waving the bartender over.

Without an introduction or any sort of explanation, she says to the bartender, "I'd like a glass of your house cabernet, please." Then, pointing to Cosima, she tells the woman, "She'll be paying." Cosima has goosebumps. The bartender looks at her with a skeptical look, as if to confirm this. She, unfortunately, cannot form words. Mouth gaping dumbly, she can only nod.

"Sure thing," the bartender tells her. After a brief moment, Delphine turns to them, her smile softer.

Quietly, she looks at Cosima and says, "Hi."

The guitarist sputters for a moment. "Hi," she manages weakly.

Delphine's smile tightens with an emotion the brunette can't quite decipher. The drummer turns to her cousin then. "Hi, Tony. It's good to see you again."

"You, too," he chuckles. "Holy shit." He glances back and forth between her and Cosima for a moment before clapping a hand on each of their shoulders. "This is… oh, man." Even he is having a hard time stringing together a coherent thought. However, it's clear he's very amused. Glancing at Delphine, he asks her, "So, I guess you're not going to, like, murder her or anything, right?"

Chuckling nervously, the blonde says. "No..."

"Yeah," he begins, "well, just had to check." Then turning back to Cosima, he squeezes her shoulder and says, "I think my work here is done then. Right?"

"Uhm, yeah. I guess?"

"Yeah," he nods knowingly. Leaning forward, he says, "I think I'm gonna head over to Sammy's a bit early—leave you two alone." Cosima nods eagerly, still dumbstruck. "If you need anything, just call me."

"I will," she tells him.

"Good. Delphine—" He turns back to face the blonde, smiling charmingly. "So nice to see you again. Truly. But, I'm afraid that I have a prior engagement."

"Oh." Her eyes brighten momentarily with hope or relief—perhaps some combination of the two. She clears her throat and holds a hand out for Tony. "Of course. Have fun."

"I will," he says enthusiastically, shaking her hand. Then, with one last mischievous glance at Cosima, he grins at her and says, "I kind of hope you two have more fun than I do though." Delphine chuckles, unable to hide her blush. Cosima's cheeks mirror her own—bright red.

Before she has the chance to rebuke him, the bartender slides Delphine her wine and he tells the woman, "Get a glass for this one, too." With that, he saunters out, waving sweetly to them. "Enjoy yourselves, ladies."

They both wave back quietly, staring after him for a moment before Delphine takes his seat. The bartender hands Cosima a glass of wine, as well, and she greedily takes a sip.

The blonde watches her. They're close now—separated by a foot perhaps. Cosima can smell her perfume, hints of her shampoo. Her mouth goes dry, in spite of the wine she just swallowed.

It's Delphine who finally breaks the silence. "How are you," she asks. Cosima can sense some genuine concern in the question, in the way the blonde's head dips and her eyes seek hers.

For once, Cosima doesn't break eye contact. "I'm really happy to see you," she says quietly, honestly.

Delphine's smile widens. "Me, too." After a moment, the blonde's expression sobers again. She lays her hand on the bar, just a couple inches from Cosima's. "I mean—this past month. I can't—" She shakes her head, finding the right words. "I can't believe all that happened to you."

"It was a little crazy," Cosima tells her, biting down on a frown. She shakes it off. "Really crazy. And kind of shitty and depressing. But," she swallows, smiling again, "this past week has made me realize that it's going to be okay. You know—we can start from scratch."

"Yeah," Delphine nods, her gaze certain. "You will. And everything will be good."

Cosima looks down at their hands. She wants to reach out and hold the blonde's, but isn't sure if she should. Instead, she clears her throat, and asks, "It's probably obvious at this point, but I've gotta ask—" She smiles sheepishly. "It _was_ you, right? The backer?"

Delphine smiles, glancing down at their hands, as well. She takes a sip of her wine before answering, with a nod. "Yes. It was me."

Cosima shakes her head in disbelief. "Wow."

"When I heard—I couldn't believe it. I was just… so worried—"

"It's fine," Cosima reassures her. "I'm fine. A little banged up at first, but... it wasn't bad."

Delphine looks down, frowning. "Still—I couldn't imagine. And I just had to help, any way I could."

_Fuck it_ , Cosima thinks. She takes one of the blonde's hands in both of hers, squeezing it tightly. "That is—" She swallows again, her throat tight. It would be so much easier to thank an anonymous fan. With Delphine, it's complicated.

Because she doesn't deserve it.

She tells Delphine that. Immediately, the blonde's brow furrows, and she tightens her grip on Cosima's hand. "Why?"

The brunette stares ashamedly into her own lap. "Because—I was so shitty to you. I mean—" She takes one of her hands back, running it through her dreads. Delphine won't let go of the other. "I said really nasty things. And I _did_ mean them." Her face burns with the admission. _Keep going,_ she tells herself. "But I couldn't stand myself for saying them. Because—true or not—as soon as—" She stops then, pursing her lips.

"What?" Delphine urges her on.

She shrugs, finishing quietly. "As soon as you were gone, they didn't matter." She looks up then—can see the glisten in Delphine's eyes, the way her throat bobs. "And maybe it's all pointless to say now—because I can't take back the things I said before—but I thought I was being so honest that night, and I wasn't really. Because if I was, when you said you loved me, I would've said it back."

Delphine is quiet for a long moment before taking Cosima's other hand in hers, playing with her fingers. "So, _you_ were the asshole?"

The brunette laughs. "I was."

"Okay," Delphine begins, staring down into her own lap. She bites her lip before continuing. "I wasn't entirely right though, to react the way I did—that night. It was stupid. I was just… ashamed, I think—of myself, in some way. And I was projecting all of that onto you. And it was unfair."

Cosima nods, then chuckles sadly. "Yeah, well, you weren't the only one." She pauses, looking up at the blonde. "I won't try to justify any of it though. I just… panicked."

"Why?"

"Because," Cosima sighs, squirming a bit. She's not proud. "There just seemed like there were so many expectations—high expectations—from everybody. From the fans and from Leekie and from _you_. And most of them were about my career, but it felt like some of them were about our relationship. And it all reminded me very much of other relationships I've had—that I just sort of fucked up spectacularly."

Delphine stares at her, brow furrowed. After a pause, she says, "I'm sorry you felt that way."

"No—" Cosima shakes her head. " _I'm_ sorry." Her own brow furrows then. "I'm really sorry, Delphine. Because what we had… it was really great for me. It didn't just feel like a vacation or a fling. It felt really—" _Permanent,_ she thinks, licking her lips. "—important. And we had one big disagreement and I turned my back on it."

"Yeah," Delphine agrees, genuine sadness present in her eyes. She doesn't let go of Cosima's hands though. "What do you want to do about it?"

Cosima knows what she wants. But asking outright would be unfair.

When she doesn't answer, Delphine's eyes narrow slightly, her tone adamant. "Cosima… just tell me. I'm not pretending anymore."

She meets the blonde's eyes. With mild defiance she says, "I want it back."

Delphine stares blankly at her for a moment, Cosima's pulse catching, before her lips quirk into a faint, knowing smirk. "How do you plan to get it?"

The brunette loses her breath for a moment, pulling back from Delphine. There's a few seconds of indecision, of stupidity before she pushes forward, capturing the blonde's lips in a soft kiss. It's a bit timid, a bit unsure. But the blonde's mouth is pliant, and opens easily to hers. In that moment, an entire month of memories seems to unfold.

Cosima draws back for air before the kiss can deepen any further. Her breath quivers as she gazes into the blonde's eyes, tucking an errant curl behind her ear.

"How's that," she asks quietly, nervously. Delphine licks her lips, her previous smile replaced with something more rapt. Something hungrier.

"It doesn't take away any of the things we said—" When she sees Cosima start, she hurries on, grasping her wrist tenderly. "But that's okay. Because my feelings haven't changed—"

"Neither have mine," Cosima interjects eagerly.

Delphine smiles. "So, we'll try again."

"Yeah," the brunette agrees, beaming suddenly. "No—we won't try. We'll just do it."

The blonde chuckles. "You seem very sure of yourself."

"I am." She leans forward, pecking her on the lips. "Of me—" another quick kiss. "And of you." The next one is deeper, more certain—a promise.

As much as Delphine would like to allow herself to get swept up in it—and she almost does—she pulls away, her hands on Cosima's cheeks. "Wait—wait."

It takes an extra second for the brunette's eyes to open. "What?"

"You're—" She takes a deep breath, though her smile does not waver. "Merde. I had this whole plan. This whole speech."

"For what?"

Delphine rolls her eyes slightly. "Did you forget why we're here in the first place?"

Distracted as she is, it takes Cosima a second to remember. "Holy shit," she says, pulling back. "Yeah… yeah."

Delphine pauses, trying to find the right words. "You said you didn't deserve this—"

"I still don't." Cosima shakes her head. "No matter what I said, or did. It's just so much money to give away. And I couldn't possibly—"

"Cosima." The blonde holds up a hand to stop her. "Listen to me—okay? I'm not just giving my money away." She smirks, her head tilting slightly. "I will be getting something in return."

Cosima laughs. "You mean the liner notes? An autographed vinyl?" Her eyes widen, a sudden thought occurring to her. Leaning forward, she grins excitedly and whispers, _"Sex?"_ Biting back a laugh, Delphine seems to consider this, but shakes her head instead. "What?"

"I'm going to give you a fairly large sum of money. And in return you will do _me_ a fairly large favor. One that I consider to be of equal value." Cosima's brow wrinkles in oblivious curiosity. With a nonchalant expression, Delphine clears her throat and tells her, "You're going to produce my next album."

Cosima's eyes widen. After a pause, she skeptically asks, "You want _me_ to produce the next In Vitro album?"

"I never said anything about In Vitro," Delphine tells her coyly, eliciting a raised eyebrow. " _My_ album—you're going to produce my solo album."

"Solo?" Cosima's face spreads into a slow grin. "For real? You'd trust me with that?"

"Of course."

Cosima laughs, her heart beating quickly with excitement. "Holy shit. Yeah—yeah, I'll do it."

"You don't have a choice," Delphine smirks, taking a sip of her wine.

"Like I even need one." Cosima straightens in her seat, the possibilities beginning to whir in her mind. "When did you want to do this? And where?"

Delphine shrugs. "We'll do it your way. Basement, storage unit—I don't care. As long as you can help me record something really great."

"Absolutely," she says, grabbing one of the blonde's hands again.

"I was thinking maybe we could begin next month?"

"Next month?" Cosima's brow scrunches in curiosity once again. It would be soon, yes, but that isn't her concern. "I thought In Vitro would be heading out on tour again next month?"

"They are." Delphine takes a breath then, her eyes gleaming with cool excitement. "And as of next week, when the press release drops, I will have officially left the band."

Cosima feels dazed, her eyebrows climbing into her hairline. She pulls back to assess Delphine, in search of some hint of a joke.

"Delphine," she begins, still shocked. "That's big."

"I know."

"Like… huge. Colossal. I mean—you've thought this through, right?"

"Of course," she says dryly.

"Oh my god." Cosima takes a long sip of her own drink. "Why?"

"Why," Delphine laughs. "Cosima—you _know_. The worst part about the fight we had wasn't that you said the things you said. It was that you said them, and they were _true._ Or… at least some of them." She pauses, smiling lightly. "I've wanted this for a long time, I think—just something of my own. Something that I can be truly proud of. I don't think I could ever have that with In Vitro."

"Shit," she says, gazing at the blonde with a sense of admiration. "But you're leaving behind, like, an entire life."

"No." Delphine shakes her head. "I'm leaving behind a life other people made up in their heads, maybe; but that's not my real life. Not the one that matters." She chuckles, shrugging. "Who knows—a year from now I could be a has-been."

"No," Cosima tells her adamantly, shaking her head. "No way. This album… I can promise you, I'll put my all into producing it. Between the two of us—it'll be amazing. I'm sure of it."

"That's a big promise." Delphine pulls her lip between teeth again. There's a fondness in her eyes at Cosima's enthusiasm. "I can practically see the gears turning in your head right now."

"Yes. Well—" She gazes at some indistinct point across the room, smiling wistfully with the possibilities. "I'm just thinking about those times we played together on tour. And I think there's so much we'll be able to do, together…"

The blonde leans forward slightly, placing a hand on Cosima's thigh. "There is, isn't there?" With a gentle squeeze, she pulls the guitarist's attention back to her, almost magnetically. The woman seems to halt, mid-thought, her head cocking just slightly.

Taking in Delphine's countenance—the heat she emits, the dilation of her pupils—her tongue darts out to lick her lips once again, pulse quickening. "Of course," she says dumbly. "I mean—as long as you don't mind, like, being crammed inside of a tiny storage unit with me for days on end." Grinning, the blonde shakes her head. Cosima feels emboldened. "It'll be close quarters. A bit… _hot_ , sometimes—"

"Really?" Her hand climbs higher.

"Yes. Definitely. Very hot." She takes an unintentionally shaky breath. "The only solution might be to—" She glances down at Delphine's hand. "—just take your shirt off. Or something."

It takes a moment, perhaps to muddle through the haze of their sudden, intense longing; but Delphine shakes herself from it, giggling. "I think we'll manage." Nervous and dizzy with joy, with relief, Cosima joins her. She falls forward, pecking the blonde once on the cheek, then on the corner of her mouth. Before she can capture her lips, however, Delphine pulls back.

She places her hand on Cosima's neck, brushing her lips along the shell of her ear. _"Pay for our drinks,"_ she whispers. Sitting back, she grins, taking a deep breath. Cosima watches the steady rise and fall of her chest—feels a rhythm in it that stokes a heavy pulse within her own.

_Should it be this simple,_ she wonders. After the hardship of the past month, the sabotage she'd committed herself to—should it be so simple—to just forget it all? To decide what does and does not matter?

Delphine tugs on her hand. "Come on, Amadeus. We have somewhere to be."

Then again—the _shoulds_ and _should-nots_ are sometimes unimportant. Sometimes, it's the _can_ and the _will_ that make a difference.

_Simple._ With Delphine's hand in hers, the music of the woman's laughter ringing in Cosima's ears, it always will be.


	23. Epilogue

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, this is it folks. I just want to say how sincerely thankful I am to all who have read and commented on this story. Since I began, I've made some really awesome friends in clone club, and feel super grateful for this neat little experience. My heart is so full.
> 
> Thank you all!

28-years-old. Over ten years of career experience. Seven major festival dates successfully performed. And still, Cosima Niehaus finds herself on the bathroom floor, spewing like an amateur.

Her head is in a toilet this time, at least, as opposed to the trashcan. She can consider that some small victory.

The hurling passes much quicker than it had years ago. After a few good heaves, she sits up and takes a deep, greedy breath.

" _Shit,"_ she groans quietly to herself, stomach still rebelling with short, persistent twists.

There's a sudden knock on the door. The guitarist flinches at the soft, familiar voice that calls out to her.

"Cosima? Are you all right?"

"Y-yeah," she says, clearing her throat. Quickly, she tears a strip of toilet paper from the dispenser. "Be out in a couple minutes." In spite of this assertion, the door jars open just a second later. Embarrassed, Cosima blushes furiously, wiping her forehead and mouth.

Delphine doesn't say anything—doesn't need to. She simply rubs Cosima's back in slow circles, waiting patiently for her humiliation to subside. It's not until the toilet has been flushed, and Cosima turns sheepishly to face her, that Delphine sighs.

"Sorry," the brunette mutters, slipping past to turn on the faucet and rinse her mouth.

"You don't have to apologize," Delphine insists, tugging on one of her dreads. "I just wish you wouldn't get sick like this." Frowning, she adds. "Not that you can help it."

Spitting into the sink a few times, Cosima shakes her head and chuckles. "I should be used to it by now. Most people would be."

"You're not most people," Delphine tells her. When Cosima meets the blonde's eyes then, her mouth hitches into a soft smile. She can see the pride in her eyes, and smiles back.

"I'm much more of a basket-case, apparently."

"No, you're not. This is the first time you've gotten sick in a while." Delphine rolls her eyes. Brow dipping, she leans against the sink and asks. "What's so different about this time? You've played this festival for the past three years."

Cosima falls back against the door, eyebrows raised. "I have, sure. But this is, like…I don't know. It feels like the first time."

Delphine considers this for a moment. "It's our first time together."

"Yeah. It is. And—" Intuitively sensing the oncoming torrent of nervous energy, Delphine steps forward and takes Cosima's hands in hers. The calming effect is instant, but not quite enough to erase her anxieties completely. "This is _our_ album, Delphine. I'm already nervous enough about the release next week. But playing these songs live for the first time is just—"

Delphine cuts her off. "Deep breath," she says quietly. Cosima opens her mouth as if to protest, to continue on, but forces herself to shut it again just a moment later. "That's it. Keep doing that."

* * *

_For late April, the temperature is unseasonably hot. And inside of the press tent, it is near stifling._

_With the cameras trained on her, an overly chic journalist beaming at her shrewdly, Cosima clutches the stick-mic like a lifeline. Delphine edges slightly closer, their knees knocking together as she answers their most recent question with eloquence and ease._

" _You two have done an excellent job of keeping this release under wraps, for all the hype you've generated. It's been very low key."_

_Delphine chuckles. "I guess so, yes. It's not necessarily that we're trying to keep it some big secret. We're just… very excited. And we'd like people to be surprised."_

"Surprised _," the journalist repeats, curious. "There's definitely been plenty of speculation. We all know you've toured with each other occasionally over the past few years, and have made appearances on each other's solo albums. But I think everyone is still wondering what it will be like for you to have gone full-throttle on a project together—what the voice of Pines will be like, compared to Nautilus or Delphine Cormier."_

" _It's different," Cosima says simply. "But not really." Delphine laughs. Glancing over, she asks, "What? It is."_

" _That's so vague," Delphine tells her, amused._

_Cosima shrugs, grinning. "You know I'm terrible at putting these things into words."_

" _I know what you're trying to say though." Turning back to the reporter, Delphine explains, "There's layers. On one hand, you have mine and Cosima's voices, just as you've come to know them in our solo work. I think that's very apparent. But on the other hand, those two voices have merged to create something entirely new. It's a very... evolved—I think is the right word. A very evolved album for us, personally. All this familiarity, mired in newness."_

_After a pause, Cosima says, "Well, that's pretty much what I said." Then, grinning, she tells the journalist, "She's better at this than I am," eliciting an eye-roll from Delphine._

" _Will this project signify an end to your solo work?"_

_Cosima is quick to answer. "No, definitely not. We write too much music to just box it into one project."_

" _And not every song we write will fit into a Pines album," Delphine adds. "We've talked about this a lot._ Right now _, this is our primary focus. It just makes sense to us."_

" _Yeah," Cosima nods enthusiastically. "This is so new for us, you know—the whole experience of recording together. It's exciting. When we play together, we really feel like we bring out the best in each other, creatively." Turning to Delphine then, she smiles. "Right?"_

_Delphine can only nod, grinning back at her with confidence._

* * *

"I don't want to fuck up."

Cosima is surprised, and mildly affronted, when Delphine laughs at this admission.

"Hey!"

"Come here." When Cosima attempts to squirm out of her grip, the blonde tugs her closer, kissing her cheek. "I'm sorry. I just—I know you _won't_. You're not going to fuck up. You always say that, but it never happens."

"Except when it does."

"Rarely," Delphine insists, exasperated. After a pause, she kisses Cosima. "So what if you do?"

" _So what_?"

"Yeah," Delphine shrugs. "If we screw up—if they don't like it—I don't care."

"Bullshit."

"No," the blonde swears. "Look at me—I don't."

Cosima peers into her eyes inquisitively. After a moment, she raises her eyebrows. "Huh. I _don't_ see any fucks in there."

Delphine chuckles. "We already made the album, Cosima. And I love it. _Really._ "

After a moment, Cosima sighs, shaking her head with a smile. "I do, too. Like, I'm _in_ love with it."

"It's incredible," Delphine says, leaning closer.

"It is."

"So who cares—" The blonde brushes their noses together, Cosima tugging her flush against her body. "Who cares if the press doesn't like it?"

"Or the In Vitro fans—"

Delphine laughs. "That doesn't matter. None of it does."

Cosima shivers lightly, parting her lips in anticipation. "No, it doesn't," she agrees. She's starting to mean it.

* * *

" _This brings up another line of questioning," the journalist says, unabashedly. They already know what she intends to talk about, of course. Delphine shrugs. "I have to ask."_

" _Everyone does," Cosima drawls. "Eventually."_

" _Well, can you blame us?" The journalist chuckles. "You've had a fairly publicized relationship. There's been so much talk these past few years."_

_Cosima rolls her eyes slightly, smiling. "I still get people telling me I_ Yoko-Ono _ed In Vitro."_

" _No," Delphine contends. "You can't Yoko the Ringo." She glances at the reporter then, tilting her head slightly. "That's what our bandmates always say."_

_The journalist laughs. "You don't seem much like a Ringo to me."_

" _She's way prettier," Cosima says unconsciously, feeling emboldened by Delphine's mild blush._

_After a pause, collecting herself in both the heat and Cosima's adoration, the blonde says seriously, "I didn't leave In Vitro for anybody but myself. Did I make that decision with other people in mind? Yes—because it allowed me the freedom to pursue other projects and relationships. But there was no ultimatum."_

" _And trust_ me _when I say, I was as surprised by that news as everybody else," Cosima appends, smirking._

" _I just wanted to be on my own musically. I was reluctant to even begin Pines."_

" _Were you," the journalist asks._

" _I'm insufferable, is what she's getting at," Cosima says cheekily._

" _She_ is _," Delphine agrees fondly. The reporter laughs. "I love my independence. And when I left In Vitro, I felt like I had something to prove. I really did. To go from being the drummer of a hugely successful band to a solo artist playing small clubs—it's jarring. I don't think many people had high expectations."_

" _I did," Cosima says earnestly._

" _That's because you produced the album. You had a stake in it, too." Delphine pauses thoughtfully. After a moment, she shrugs. "I kind of figured we'd end up doing this at some point. We've been touring together on and off for three years in addition to—you know—everything else. But I didn't want to make this commitment until I felt people could respect me on my own."_

" _I don't think you have to worry about that now," the reporter says._

" _No." Delphine's voice is certain as she continues. "I know others respect my music. I respect it now, too. That's big for me." She smiles suddenly, Cosima grinning with pride beside her, and chuckles. "I still kind of feel like people were expecting an In Vitro knockoff."_

" _Oh my god." Cosima laughs, too. "That album was, like,_ so _far from In Vitro."_

" _And Pines," the journalist asks knowingly._

" _Even farther."  
_

* * *

It always happens like this. One moment they're kissing tenderly, romantically. Whispering chaste, encouraging thoughts to each other.

The next moment, Delphine is on her knees, one of Cosima's legs hooked over her shoulder as she laves the brunette's slick folds with her tongue.

It might be crass. She'd like for them to be doing this somewhere other than a bathroom—preferably back at their hotel, or even better, in the comfort of their San Francisco apartment. However, comfort is sometimes a luxury. And with the immolating heat of their passion, the frisson of their pre-performance anticipation, it would be masochistic _not_ to succumb.

At least, that's what she tells herself.

Cosima's hips lurch against her as she sucks gently on her clit. "Fuck," the brunette groans, dipping her fingers into her scalp. Seeking more pressure, she pulls Delphine's face closer. Her girlfriend, however, resists, continuing on with her maddeningly unhurried pace. "Babe—sh-shit." Her eyes screw shut, the back of her head hitting the door harder than she'd intended. Delphine chuckles, the vibrations causing another spike of need to lance through her.

Cosima's voice wavers. "You're cruel." The blonde responds with a playful nip. "Oh my god."

She's ready to break, and Delphine is ready to relent, to caress her more fervently. Before she has the chance, however, there's a sudden pounding on the door.

Three voices holler at them from the other side.

"Oi!"

"Quit your shaggin'!"

"Pants up, ladies!"

They should be surprised, or embarrassed—mortified, more like. But both are so used to these types of humbling interruptions that they can only sigh.

Looking down at Delphine, Cosima shakes her head, a note of desperation in her voice. "I'm fucking dying. I'm serious."

"I know," Delphine says apologetically, stroking her thigh. "Just ignore them. They'll go away."

Immediately, Sarah shouts through the door, laughing, "No, we won't!"

"Oh god." Cosima groans, covering her face with her hands.

After a moment, her agitation mounting, Delphine pounds once on the door, hard. "Five minutes!" It's not a request.

They can hear the hushed deliberation on the other side. Twenty seconds pass, both holding their breath, _aching_ , before Sarah sighs.

Finally, Felix tells them, "Five minutes is _all_ you'll get. Any longer, and I'm sending Sarah in after you."

"Don't enjoy yourselves too much," Tony calls. "You still need to walk onstage."

They wait a few moments, until they're certain the others are gone.

Delphine looks up at Cosima then, hands on her hips, reaching around to squeeze her ass. "Still into it?" Cosima nods eagerly. The blonde chuckles, eyes darkening. "Let's not waste another moment."

* * *

" _I'm curious now. I think you each have a very distinct voice. And on your solo albums, you've explored very different themes."_

" _Definitely," Cosima nods._

" _I can honestly say, when I listen to a Nautilus album, it plays very much as a narrative. I felt the same way when listening to your album, Delphine. So, I'm curious what story you'll choose to tell on the Pines debut."_

_Cosima and Delphine look knowingly at each other. Finally, Cosima shrugs, smiling coyly._

_When she turns back to the reporter, she explains, "There's a lot of firsts on this album. We pushed each other. Like, when I've written songs in the past, I've usually written them from someone else's point of view. And sometimes that person was real, but mostly it was just a character I had made up._

" _Delphine and I spent so much time talking our way to this record. I mean—just asking each other a million questions. It was very confessional. Which… in retrospect, I don't think my Nautilus albums have been—not entirely. Everything I wrote for this album, though, was from my perspective. I wrote every song as Cosima."_

" _So it's more personal for you?"_

" _Yeah," she nods. Then, laughing, "Almost frighteningly so."_

" _She even wrote love songs," Delphine teases._

" _No," Cosima contests. "I wrote_ relationship _songs. There's a difference."_

" _Keep telling yourself that." Turning to the journalist, she says, "She hates love songs."_

" _I do_ not _."_

_The journalist chuckles. "What_ is _the difference?"_

_Cosima sighs. "A love song is like, 'I wanna hold you for a thousand years. I can see inside your soul. Your kisses taste like sunshine.' It's super cheesy. But a relationship song is more like, 'I accidentally got plastered with my cousin and puked on our bed, and you called me an asshole, but then came and slept on the bathroom floor with me anyway.' I love that shit."_

_The journalist pauses, narrowing her eyes in thought. "I see." Then, turning slowly to Delphine, she asks, "Did she really puke on your bed?"_

_Before the blonde can answer, Cosima covers her mouth and grins. "No comment."  
_

* * *

Despite their bandmates' claims, nobody says a word when they emerge from the bathroom, hearts still pounding, a full minute after their allotted time has expired. Cosima is grateful. While most of her nerves had abated under Delphine's ministrations, a few anxieties linger. She'd like just to bask in the quiet the blonde affords her for a moment longer.

The crowd is already roaring though. The oppressive heat has made them more fervent than usual—more temperamental. She's already heard of a couple smaller acts having walked off the stage with their heads held in shame earlier this evening.

It's later now, and the audience will be hot and restless enough that they'll either love or hate the performance; and no matter the outcome, they'll do so with a passion.

Cosima and Delphine stand in the darkness of the wings for ten minutes, hands clasped tightly together. Sarah, Felix, and Tony join them just before show time.

"Are you ready," Felix asks, the question mostly directed at Cosima.

"Yeah," she nods, Delphine squeezing her hand.

"Good."

"You?"

Felix grins charmingly. "I was born ready, darling."

The stage manager pokes his head through the curtain a moment later, his bulky earpiece already in place. "We're ready for you guys. So is the crowd." Cosima gives him a thumbs up, and he disappears again with a nod.

Tony claps both Cosima and Delphine on the shoulder, gesturing towards the curtain. "Ladies first." Sarah punches his shoulder immediately.

"Hey!" He flinches, glaring pointedly at the drummer. "I meant _non-violent_ ladies first."

She rolls her eyes. "He's right. You two do the honors."

Cosima nods back at her, taking a deep breath. Then, her eyes fall on Delphine.

Delphine, who is smiling. Delphine, who is unafraid.

The blonde leans down, pecking her on the lips. With a light tug of the hand, she says, "C'mon. Let's knock their socks off."

"Yeah," Cosima agrees. "Let's."

Cosima, who is smiling right back. Cosima, who is afraid, but quickly forgetting why.

**Author's Note:**

> I've been wanting to do this for a while. It's a band AU, so it won't be too angst-heavy, but it will arrive at some point. Title is taken from the St. Vincent song. I hope you enjoy!


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